MINSK. July 13 (Interfax) - The Belarusian State Security Committee (KGB) has removed Roman Protasevich and Sofia Sapega, who were earlier pardoned by the country's president, from the list of organizations and individuals involved in terrorist activities.
The entries saying that Protasevich and Sapega are involved in terrorist activities have been removed from the updated version of the document published on the KGB's official website.
Protasevich's pardon by the Belarusian president was announced at the end of May, and that of Sapega, a Russian citizen, in early June.
As reported earlier, after Sapega was pardoned on June 7, she was released from a correctional colony in Gomel and handed over to a delegation from Russia's Primorye Territory led by Governor Oleg Kozhemyako.
The Russian embassy to Belarus said earlier that Sapega had agreed to be extradited to Russia, after which Russian and Belarusian law enforcement agencies began settling the formalities.
Sapega and Protasevich, an opposition Belarusian journalist, were detained at Minsk Airport on May 23, 2021, after a Ryanair flight from Athens to Vilnius, on which they were returning from vacation, was forced to land under the pretext of a bomb threat.
A Belarusian court ruled in May 2022 to sentence Sapega to six years in prison, finding her guilty of fomenting social enmity and discord causing grave consequences and illegally collecting and circulating personal data, causing damage to victims' rights, freedoms, and legitimate interests.
After being convicted, Sapega submitted a request for pardon to the Belarusian president in June 2022, which he declined in January 2023. In March 2023, she was put on the list of individuals involved in terrorist activities.
It was reported in April that the Belarusian Prosecutor General's Office granted Sapega's request that she be transferred to Russia to serve the remainder of her prison term at home.
Protasevich was editor-in-chief of the Nexta and Belarus Golovnogo Mozga (Belarus of the Brain) websites, which were designated as extremist in Belarus. Nexta was also officially labeled a terrorist organization.
Previously, in 2020, the Belarusian authorities added Nexta founders Stepan Putilo and Protasevich to the list of individuals engaged in terrorist activity.
Apart from Protasevich, Putilo and Yan Rudik, a former Nexta editor, were also implicated in the case. They are currently outside of Belarus. They were tried in absentia and sentenced to 20 and 19 years in prison, respectively.
The defendants were found guilty of publicly calling for the seizure of power and committing acts of terrorism, insulting the president, spreading knowingly false information about Belarus, and other crimes.
Protasevich was sentenced to eight years in prison on May 3, 2023. However, he told journalists on May 22 that he had been pardoned.