Ukrainian journalist Pavlo Sharoyko, jailed for eight years for espionage in Belarus, has applied for a pardon, Belarusian Deputy Prosecutor General Alexei Stuk said.
“He has filed a request for pardon. The commission is considering it,” Stuk said at a press conference in Minsk on June 25.
“The final decision has been postponed until certain conditions,” he said without disclosing what those conditions are.
It was reported on November 20, 2017, that Sharoyko had been caught in flagrante delicto. According to the Belarusian State Security Committee (KGB), his intelligence-gathering activities in Belarus were coordinated by Ihor Skvortsov, an officer of the Ukrainian Defense Ministry’s Main Intelligence Directorate, who had been undercover as a counselor at the Ukrainian embassy in Minsk. Belarus declared Skvortsov persona non grata for activities inconsistent with his diplomatic status.
Ukraine expelled a Belarusian diplomat based on the principle of reciprocity.
On February 19, 2018, the Belarusian Supreme Court sentenced Sharoyko to eight years of imprisonment for espionage.
The Belarusian KGB said earlier that the Ukrainian citizen may be pardoned.
