Those arrested in the "Booksellers' Case" have gradually been released. Except for one

Zmitser Kolas with the books he published. At the Minsk Book Exhibition 2023. Photo: Facebook

According to Nasha Niva, Vatslaw Bahdanovich, founder of the "Technalohiya" publishing house, has been released. His daughter Viktoryia was also released. 75-year-old veteran publisher Zmitser Sanko has also been released.

The prominent translator and publisher Zmitser Kolas remains imprisoned. It is likely he is in the pre-trial detention center of the State Security Committee. According to our information, he has been charged under Article 361-1 of the Criminal Code — leadership of an extremist formation. Why Kolas faced the worst fate is still unclear.

At the same time, in the case of Andrei Kim — another prominent cultural figure who was detained simultaneously with the booksellers, but likely on a different matter — everything was limited to administrative arrest.

While there have been releases, the defendants in the case are paralyzed by non-disclosure agreements and their legal statuses. Independent publishing activity within Belarus has been reduced almost to zero.

Moreover, it turned out that throughout February and March, searches were conducted at the homes of several other Belarusian intellectuals and cultural veterans. There are rumors in Minsk that they were beaten and humiliated during these searches, and books were confiscated from their personal libraries.

Павялічыць

Zmitser Kolas. Photo from Zmitser Kolas's Facebook page

Zmitser Kolas is a prominent figure in contemporary Belarusian book publishing and Belarusian culture in general.

He was born in Minsk in 1956 into the family of Georhiy Kolas, a cultural historian, literary and theater critic, and author of books about Belarusian classics. His brother, Uladzimir Kolas, is a film director, educator, and long-time director of the Yakub Kolas Belarusian Humanitarian Lyceum.

Zmitser Kolas graduated from the translation faculty of the Minsk State Institute of Foreign Languages. After graduation, he worked for several years under contract in Algeria and Syria, where the Soviet Union was implementing numerous economic projects at the time. Returning to Minsk, he taught artistic translation to students at the same institute where he once studied.

In the 1980s, he was the first to make brilliant translations of Camus, Sartre, and Ionesco into Belarusian – authors whose works resonated with the atmosphere in Belarus at the time.

From the late 1980s, Zmitser Kolas increasingly dedicated his life to publishing. He published literature for schoolchildren at the Belarusian Humanitarian Lyceum. Later, he became the editor-in-chief of the private publishing house "Encyclopedix." And eventually, he founded his own publishing house, which bore his name.

The "Zmitser Kolas" publishing house specialized in translating world literature – poetry, prose, and drama – into Belarusian. The "Poets of the Planet" series, featuring translations of poets from various countries, gained particular renown. In total, over 100 books were published in this collection.

The publishing house also released other intellectual texts – philosophy, humanitarian studies, literary criticism. It published works by Albert Camus, Jean-Paul Sartre, François Rabelais, Charles Baudelaire, René Descartes, and other authors.

Recall that on March 3, the "coalition of printed publishers 'Kamunikat.org Foundation', Lohvinau Publishing House, Andrei Yanushkevich Publishing" was recognized as an "extremist formation." The corresponding decision was made by the State Security Committee.

This decision followed the mass detentions of publishers and booksellers in Minsk in February. All detainees were initially sent to serve days under administrative protocols, which, as is common now, were drawn up on fabricated grounds.

The list of people whom the authorities consider connected with this "coalition" includes well-known names in the book community. The websites and social networks of the publishing houses were also included in the list.

Those who were deemed part of the coalition's activities were arrested.

The people rounded up in this case were very diverse: one a brilliant translator, another a bookseller from the "White Legion," and a third a classic businessman.

Clarification. Initially, in this material, the article of the Criminal Code imputed to Zmitser Kolas was mistakenly referred to as 361-3, not 361-1.

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