Committee to Protect Journalists urges Belarusian authorities to return citizenship to Pavel Sharamet

The international non-governmental organisation with headquarters in New York has made a statement of protest.

The Committee to Protect Journalists was created by a US reporter and is engaged in defence of journalists' rights, collecting information about repressions worldwide and about repressions against journalists.

“CPJ calls on Belarusian authorities to immediately return Pavel Sheremet's (Paval Sharamet) citizenship and passport, and allow him to travel freely to his native country,” said CPJ Europe and Central Asia Program Coordinator Nina Ognianova. “Sheremet has long been critical of the regime of Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko and has been jailed, attacked, and harassed for his work in the past. This latest official move appears as yet another act of official retaliation. It must be stopped at once."

On Wednesday, March 30, Sharamet stated that the Embassy of Belarus in Moscow informed him he had been deprived of the Belarusian citizenship. As said by the journalist, who presently lives in Russia, the official note from the embassy does not state the grounds on which he had been stripped of citizenship, and which authority had made that.