EU parliament calls on Belarus to stop mistreating imprisoned political hopeful

By YURAS KARMANAU
Associated Press

TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — The European Parliament has demanded that Belarusian authorities stop the mistreatment of a former presidential hopeful imprisoned for standing up to the country’s authoritarian leader and immediately release him and other political prisoners. Viktar Babaryka was handed a 14-year prison sentence in 2021 on charges that he rejected as a political punishment for launching a bid to challenge Belarusian authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko in a 2020 presidential election. The European Parliament said in Thursday’s statement that Babaryka was hospitalized in April with traces of beatings that required surgery. Babaryka’s supporters said that the authorities haven’t released any information about his condition and barred a lawyer from visiting him.