The Russian woman Sofya Sapega, detained in Belarus after the incident with the Ryanair plane, was arrested for two months, her lawyer Alexander Filanovich told RT.
According to him, the girl is suspected of a criminal offense and is now being held in the KGB pre-trial detention center.
He noted that the investigation into her case is being conducted by the Main Investigation Department of the Investigative Committee of the Republic of Belarus.
However, the lawyer refused to clarify what Sapega was accused of, referring to a non-disclosure agreement.
At the same time, footage of the interrogation of Sophia Sapieha appeared on the Internet, in which she says that she was the editor of the Black Book of Belarus, a telegram channel that published data from Belarusian security officials.
Sophia Sapega was detained at the Minsk airport together with 26-year-old Roman Protasevich, the founder of the NEXTA Telegram channel recognized as extremist in Belarus.
They were returning from a trip to Greece when a Ryanair passenger plane on the Athens-Vilnius route made an emergency landing in Minsk.
According to the official data of the Belarusian authorities, the Ryanair board landed after receiving an email about the threat of an explosion on board.
Routine trip with a young man
According to RT, Sophia Sapega was born in Russia, but has been living in Belarus since the age of 8, where she has a residence permit.
According to her relatives, she is studying at the European Humanities University (EHU) in Vilnius under the program "International Law and European Union Law", and is finishing her master's degree this year.
As the girl's mother Anna Dudich told RT, it was "an ordinary trip with a young man, entailing nothing."
“She was detained only because she is a companion of Roman Protasevich.
They met about six months ago.
She always spoke only positively about him.
My daughter is a very selective person.
I always said about him that it was a megamind.
Very calm, very balanced, ”says Dudich.
According to Dudich, she does not know how her daughter met Protasevich.
“Sophia is a literate person, very well-read.
A very decent person.
She painted beautifully, the drawings were unusual.
She was fond of philosophy.
He speaks English almost perfectly.
Probably, the meeting between them took place like this - on the intellectual level.
They just met, they had a joint vacation in Greece.
We called up with her the day before.
She said everything went well.
I liked the rest.
And in the morning already from her came a text message with the word “mother”, when she was already at the airport in Minsk, ”continues the girl's mother.
Dudich notes that Sophia has always been far from politics.
However, when asked how her daughter reacted to the events in Belarus last summer, the woman did not want to celebrate.
About the video of her daughter's interrogation spread on the Internet, where she confesses that she was the editor of the “Black Book of Belarus”, the mother said that she had revised it several times and is now in shock.
“We ourselves do not understand anything, we are in a state of shock.
We no longer know where to go.
I would really like our law enforcement agencies, in particular, the Republic of Belarus, to be able to figure it out.
And I hope that our girl will be free, ”added Sapieha's mother.
According to Sophia's father Andrei Sapega, he learned that his daughter was dating a well-known oppositionist three months ago.
He also assures that his daughter was not interested in politics.
“Sophia is essentially an apolitical person.
She never took part in protest actions, showed no interest in politics at all.
Her area of interest was centered around her studies and the usual things for girls - travel, fashion, ”he told RT.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said that diplomats are working to clarify the situation with Russian citizen Sophia Sapega.
On the morning of May 24, the Russian embassy sent a note to the Belarusian Foreign Ministry with a request to officially confirm the detention of the Russian woman and provide consular access to her.
On May 25, the Russian consul met with a Russian woman arrested in the republic.
RIA Novosti reports.
"Youthful maximalism"
Sophia's companion, Roman Protasevich, became famous as an oppositionist at the age of 16, when in the summer of 2011 he was detained at a "silent rally" in Minsk.
Protasevich was released from the police department as a minor, but his parents and school were informed.
After that, the young man was expelled from the prestigious BNTU lyceum.
Reuters
Roman himself said in an interview with opposition media that his parents did not support him then, they kicked him out of the house and he lived with “kind people”.
According to him, the mother even tried to drag her son into an exorcism session in order to "drive out the devils."
In the same 2011, Roman joined the ranks of the youth radical nationalist group "Young Front".
“He was involved in the development of the strategy and tactics of the youth structure, organized protest events, disseminated agitation and propaganda attributes, and involved minors in active protest activities.
In 2012, he was detained by the police as an administrator of social networks, the content of which was destructive, "says journalist Konstanin Pridybailo to RT.
Tatyana Mikhnova, director of school No. 94, to which Protasevich was taken after being expelled from the lyceum, explained to RT that she had enrolled Roman in the final class only because of the good attitude towards his dad, the colonel, the head of the ideological work department at the Military Academy.
“I then asked my dad what was the reason for the transition.
He replied "youthful maximalism," "she recalls.
According to her, Roman looked more mature than his peers, kept aloof and did not make friends with anyone, did not even go to prom.
After leaving school, in 2012, Protasevich entered the Faculty of Journalism at BSU.
“And then later he never greeted us, when sometimes he met on the bus,” recalls Tatiana Mikhnova.
"Was on the line of contact"
At BSU Protasevich studied at the correspondence department and in 6 years he was able to reach only the fourth year.
In 2018, he was expelled due to poor academic performance (4 failed exams).
According to media reports, in 2014, Roman Protasevich left for Ukraine.
It was reported that he met there with the head of the ultra-right "National Alliance" and an active participant in the Maidan, Igor Guz.
Allegedly, at the suggestion of the latter, he joined the Azov battalion, where he underwent special training.
Roman himself claimed that he worked in the Donbass in the war zone as a journalist.
“He said that he was covering events as a correspondent for Radio Liberty *.
There is a correspondence of people, these are Ukrainian nationalists, members of the Azov battalion, who discussed Protasevich.
He was there, on the line of contact.
The fact is that he was from the Azov national corps, - said Konstantin Pridybailo.
It is worth noting that an interview with Dmitry Protasevich's father, which was recorded in the summer of last year, is now open on social networks.
In the video, the man claims that his son was first prosecuted in 2014, when “he was in the territory of Donbass and fought on the side of the Ukrainian army”.
It is worth noting that due to the activities of their son, Dmitry and his wife were eventually dismissed from the Belarusian army and stripped of their military ranks.
They now live in Poland.
Flight to Poland
In 2019, Protasevich began hosting the Nexta Live telegram channel, which has become very popular with the Belarusian opposition.
And on January 22, 2020, the young man asked Poland to grant him asylum.
Reuters
Protasevich said that he was persecuted at home after taking part in a campaign in support of the owner and editor-in-chief of by24.org, Vladimir Chudentsov, who was detained in November 2019 for drug smuggling.
After Protasevich took refuge in Poland, Nexta's audience grew rapidly in the wake of the August 2020 protests that erupted after the presidential election, reaching 2 million subscribers.
At the same time, even activists often criticized the channel for inappropriate campaigning, posts about an imminent victory, and outright fakes.
The most striking case is reports of Moscow special forces dispersing protesters in Minsk.
The channel's management referred to the news coming from users.
At the end of September 2020, Protasevich left Nexta, after which he developed the telegram channel “Belarus of the Brain”.
The channel itself and the Nexta logo were declared extremist by the court of Belarus in October 2020.
At the end of 2020, the Investigative Committee of Belarus reported that Protasevich was charged under three articles -
organizing mass riots (art. 293 of the Criminal Code), organizing actions that grossly violate public order (art. 342);
incitement of social enmity based on professional affiliation (part 3 of article 130).
The reason for this was the publication in the Telegram channel of calls for disobedience, blocking roads.
He was put on the wanted list.