MINSK, December 20. /TASS/: The Belarusian Investigative Committee has handed over the criminal case against Russian national Sofia Sapega, accused on four counts of the republic’s Criminal Code, to a prosecutor for submitting it to a court of law for trial, the Investigative Committee reported on Monday.
"The criminal case against Sofiya Sapega has been handed over to the prosecutor for submitting it to a court of law. The accused has finished acquainting herself with the materials of the criminal case in a law-established procedure. House arrest has remained as a provisional measure," the statement reads.
The Belarusian Investigative Committee has said that the criminal case is based on seven counts of the republic’s Criminal Code, under which Sapega is charged by the Investigative Committee’s Main Investigation Department.
As the Belarusian Investigative Committee specified, the Russian national is accused of committing "deliberate acts aimed at inciting other social strife, strife based on a different social affiliation as committed by an organized group of individuals that entailed other grave consequences" and also of "organizing violence and threats of the use of violence against an interior officer and his relatives for the purposes of obstructing his lawful activity."
Sapega is also accused of "organizing pressure on an interior officer for the purpose of altering the nature of his lawful activity by way of a threat, through the destruction or damage of property, the dissemination of slander and the disclosure of other information," "organizing violence and threats of the use of violence through the destruction or damage of property in relation to an official discharging his official duties."
The Russian national is also accused of "organizing a threat of murder, violence, destruction or damage of property against a judge and the judge’s relatives, organizing efforts to obstruct in any form whatsoever the professional activity of a journalist, force him to give up the dissemination of information, as committed with the use of violence, destruction or damage of property, the infringement upon the rights and legitimate interests of a journalist," and also of "deliberately and illegally gathering and spreading information on the private life and personal data of another individual without the individual’s consent that materially damaged the rights, freedoms and legitimate interests of a citizen (the affected party)."
"In the course of the preliminary investigation, the accused fulfilled the terms of the plea agreement signed with her," the Belarusian Investigative Committee said.
Sapega was detained at Minsk Airport on May 23 along with Roman Protasevich, one of the co-founders of the Nexta Telegram channel, which was recognized as extremist in Belarus, after a Ryanair flight made an emergency landing. The Vilnius-bound flight that took off from Athens was forced to make an emergency landing in Minsk after a reported bomb threat on board. Sapega and Protasevich were placed under house arrest in late June.
