Volha Klaskouskaja is sentenced to eight-year imprisonment in Sweden

Stockholm court found Belarusan citizen, a prominent Belarusian opposition journalist guilty for the attempted murder of her husband Gökhay Bezgin and sentenced her to eight years in prison.

As Julia Lapitski, the journalist who lives in Sweden and watches this process, told BelaPAN, Stockholm Court also ruled on August 23 that Volha Klaskouskaja must pay 110,000 Swedish crowns ($15,000) to her ex-spouse as compensation.

Let us recall that Klaskouskaja has been living outside Belarus since 2006. As RFE/RL reports, she was last in her home country in 2011 to support her brother, who was jailed for taking part in a protest against President Aliaksandr Lukashenka.

After that Swedish media reported that Volha Klaskouskaja was accused of trying to stab her former Swedish husband of Turkish origin Gökhay Bezgin in Stockholm during an argument. As it became known, Volha Klaskouskaja was arrested on March 30 and remained in pre-trial detention until April 15 after her ex-husband accused her of trying to stab him.

In late January, Swedish authorities rejected Klaskouskaja’s application for a residence permit. In April, Swedish immigration officials ruled that she and her 11-year-old daughter from a previous relationship should be deported to Belarus for violations of immigration regulations. The authorities said her 8-month-old son could stay with in Sweden with his Swedish father.

As BelaPAN tells, Klaskouskaja married the Swede about a year and a half ago and gave birth to their son in July 2012. However, she has been denied a Swedish residence permit twice. Her Schengen visa expired on February 28.

However, Volha is not planning to give up; now she is going to appeal an eight-year prison sentence imposed on her by a Swedish judge on August 23. According to her mother, Volha would appeal to the foreign ministry, government-controlled media outlets, European organizations and Russian lawyer Pavel Astakhov, who defends the rights of children abroad, to intervene in the case.