The Prosecutor General’s Office of Belarus granted Sofya Sapega’s request to transfer her to Russia to serve her sentence, RIA Novosti reports with reference to the department.
“The Belarusian side has not established any grounds preventing the transfer of the convict to the state of her nationality,” the press service noted, adding that the harm caused was compensated in full.
The prosecutor’s office sent the Russian side its consent to extradite Sapega, she will return to Russia after receiving guarantees for the execution of the sentence.
The Russian woman was sentenced to six years in prison last spring on charges of inciting social hatred and illegally collecting and distributing data about her private life. She was accused of administering the Black Book of Belarus telegram channel (recognized as extremist in the country) – it published the personal data of security officials who used force against protesters (after the 2020 presidential elections, the country was gripped by mass protests that were brutally suppressed). The convict was ordered to compensate the victims for moral damage – 167,500 Belarusian rubles (more than 5.1 million Russian rubles at the current exchange rate) and a court fee in the amount of 7,488 Belarusian rubles (more than 232 thousand Russian rubles).
Sapieha was detained in May 2021 in Minsk along with Roman Protasevich, former editor-in-chief of the opposition telegram channel Nexta (recognized as a terrorist organization in Belarus), they were removed from a Ryanair plane after an emergency landing. Protasevich is included in the list of terrorists, he is charged with organizing mass riots, plotting to seize power, inciting hatred, and also leading an extremist formation.
This week it became known that Sapieha agreed to be extradited to Russia. At first, the Russian woman asked for pardon, but she was denied.
