TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — Journalist Ksenia Lutskina served only half of her eight-year prison sentence in Belarus after being convicted of conspiracy to overthrow the government. She was pardoned after she kept fainting in her cell from a brain tumor diagnosed during pretrial detention.
“I was literally brought to the penal colony in a wheelchair, and I realized that journalism has really turned into a life-threatening profession in Belarus,” she told The Associated Press in Vilnius, Lithuania, where she lives.
Lutskina was one of dozens of journalists imprisoned in Belarus, where many face beatings, poor medical care and the inability to contact lawyers or relatives, according to activists and former inmates.
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