Pardoned and deported Ukrainian Kotovich explained the insult Lukashenko took offense at.

Alexander moved to Belarus from Ukraine in 2019. The reason is simple - love. In 2016, in Odessa, where he is from, he met a Belarusian girl.

They tried to live together in both Ukraine and Poland, but eventually settled in Belarus, where they got married.

— I started applying for a residence permit, found a job... And in 2022, the war began. I expressed my position immediately.

Alexander admits that it was difficult to restrain his emotions, so he started writing comments in the "Belarus Beyond MKAD" chat.

— I wrote that Russia is an occupier, an aggressor, and so on.

But he says that it didn't last long - Alexander calmed down and even forgot about those comments he had left. And a year and a half later, he was reminded of them.

— On August 8, 2023, at six in the morning, GUBOPiK (Main Directorate for Combating Organized Crime and Corruption) came to me. About eight people with strobe lights, shields, helmets, and pistols. They handcuffed me and said: "You wrote, wrote, and wrote yourself into trouble. Good job."

At GUBOPiK, Alexander was threatened, beaten, and also forced to record a confession video.

— Everyone asked: "Are you working with the SBU (Security Service of Ukraine)?!". They joked: sometimes they said that "you won't get out of here," sometimes "maybe we'll let you go in three days." In the end, they took me to the investigator. He said that I shouldn't have any illusions, as a criminal case had been opened under Article 130 part 1 - incitement to hatred. Basically, for writing "Russians are such and such." The investigator said that things would be bad for me.

Then the Ukrainian ended up in Akrestsina detention center. He calls the three days there the most terrible of all time.

— I was placed in a punishment cell - a room of three or four square meters. There were 12 other people there. Everyone was standing because there was almost no place to sit. So we took turns sitting. You sit for a little while and then stand up so that someone else can rest. It was summer - sometimes they made a draft, sometimes they closed everything and the temperature rose to 45 degrees Celsius. It was so hot that you could just wring out your T-shirts - sweat was pouring down. On the last day, I got very sick.

The next stop for Alexander was Volodarka prison. The conditions there were not much better: overcrowded cells, bedbugs, terrible treatment.

Alexander spent six months in Volodarka, during which time he had several different investigators, and the number of criminal charges kept increasing.

In the end, he was charged under four articles - they added 361 prim. 1 part 3 (participation in an extremist formation), 367 part 2 (libel against Lukashenko), 368 part 2 (insulting Lukashenko).

— Somewhere I wrote "mustachioed." This was considered an insult to Lukashenko. And the libel was that I wrote that administrative resources were used in the elections in Belarus to achieve the necessary results.

The Belarusian police considered Alexander to be the sole creator of the "Belarus Beyond MKAD" channels. But the man explains that this is not the case:

— When I was arrested, I was in the "Belarus Beyond MKAD" chat - I was indeed an active participant and wrote a lot of things. I responded to comments like "Kill the nationalists, kill the khokhols (Ukrainians)." At that time, the chat was not yet on the list of extremist formations - it ended up there after my detention. But they pinned that article on me retroactively.

Alexander says that at first he was indeed suspected of creating that chat, but in the end, this was disproven.

On March 28, 2023, the Ukrainian was convicted - given 5 years in a penal colony. This came as a shock to Alexander.

— I was just writing the truth, nothing like that. According to the law, I could have been punished with a fine or had my residence permit annulled and been deported from Belarus. But it's obvious that the people who were staging the trial against me were carrying out an order from above. That's why my appeal didn't work either.

Павялічыць

He was sent to serve his sentence in colony No. 17 in Shklov, where Alexander stayed for a year and four months, until he was suddenly released.

— They say that Lukashenko once worked as a controller in this colony - so now it's a model one, and management from other colonies often comes there to learn from their experience. On the outside, everything is pretty good: lawn, ventilated facades, repairs are always being done... New restrooms, TVs, a well-equipped store and a communication point. But I have heard more than once that it is easier for "extremists" to live in other colonies.

The man worked in production and, like other "extremists," received a ridiculous salary for his hard work - from 2 to 15 rubles per month.

Alexander worked in a sewing factory - ironing details, from which clothes were then sewn for Russian soldiers.

The man didn't know until the very last moment that he would be handed over to Ukraine. It all started when he was told on the evening of November 20 not to go to work for the night shift.

In the middle of the night, Alexander was sent to the checkpoint - ordered to take all his belongings with him.

— I had about 40 kilograms of things in three large bags. Not so long ago, my wife bought me a certificate to a store (because I wasn't allowed to receive money) and I stocked up - and you could only do this once every three months. There was another Ukrainian with me, convicted on drug charges. By the way, he only had 40 days left to serve. We were searched and placed in a "glass" (a small holding cell).

Closer to noon, the colony staff conducted another search - throwing out almost everything. Alexander was allowed to keep two pairs of underwear, two pairs of socks, gloves, a hat, a padded jacket, shoes, toothpaste, and a toothbrush.

— The person who conducted the search said: "You won't need anything else." He didn't explain anything else. We were taken to quarantine, where the attitude was different: they brought us tea, coffee, and gave us cigarettes. Then they said that a transfer was waiting for us.

Павялічыць

The long road home began on November 22 at 2 a.m. After another search, the Ukrainians were told that they would be taken to a pre-trial detention center for investigative actions.

— We were led to a white Ford Transit, handcuffed, and bags were put over our heads. After that, I had the thought that we would most likely be taken abroad. I had heard before that people were taken to Lithuania like this, with bags over their heads. So I understood that we were going either to Lithuania or to Ukraine.

According to Alexander, the journey to the final destination took seven hours. He says that many cars gathered in a field, and people began to be transferred to a van.

— There were about nine people with me, we started talking and realized that we were all Ukrainians. That is, it became completely clear that we would be handed over to someone. We were only allowed to take off the bags on the Belarusian-Ukrainian border. The border was empty, there was no one there. We were given sandwiches to eat. Then I saw a large bus with Ukrainian symbols. Special services and snipers came out of it - a lot of people. We got into the Ukrainian bus, they started taking pictures with us and welcoming us to Ukraine.

The released people were immediately taken to a hospital for examination.

According to Alexander's observations, among the 31 people released by Lukashenko, there were 7-8 political prisoners.

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