Entrepreneur Sviatlana Dvaraninava on hunger strike in a Vitsebsk detention center

Entrepreneur Sviatlana Dvaraninava has resumed a hunger strike in a preliminary detention facility in Vitsbesk. She was sentenced to six and a half years in prison. Lawyer Natallya Tarasyuk said the entrepreneur on September 21 filed complaints to the chairman of the Vitsebsk Regional Court and the Prosecutor of the Vitsebsk region and refused from taking food at noon of the same day.

Dvaraninava said she resorted to hunger-striking to express protest against a gross violation of the Criminal and Criminal Procedural Laws by the investigation, prosecutors and the courts during the proceedings.

The woman uses the hunger strike in order to revoke her sentence and drop the criminal charges. Tarasyuk said it was the second hunger strike by Dvaraninava. In the first case, she spent 23 days on a hunger strike.

The lawyer could not comment on the health conditions of her client, explaining that she works in Minsk. On August 13, Dvaraninava was sentenced by a Vitsebsk court to six and a half years in prison in accordance with two articles in the Penal Code: swindling and embezzlement through the abuse of office.

On September 18, the Vitsebsk Regional Court upheld the ruling of the district court, reports Belapan.