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Two journalists fined for posing for photographs with teddy bear in their hands

 

Two journalists were fined on Thursday for posing for photographs with a teddy bear in their hands, BelaPAN said.

Judge Dzmitry Pawlyuchenka of the Savetski District Court in Minsk found photographer Yuliya Darashkevich and Iryna Kozlik, a staff writer with the Belarus version of the Russian newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda, guilty of staging an unauthorized demonstration and sentenced them to a fine of three million rubels ($360) each.

The pair were arrested near the Palace of Art in the Belarusian capital on the evening of August 8.

Ms. Kozlik said that she would not appeal the fine because it would be "useless." Ms. Darashkevich was undecided on the possibility of appealing the sentence.

Teddy bears have become an unlikely symbol of fight for democracy in Belarus following “toy protests” held by opposition activists in Minsk and last month’s drop of teddy bears on Belarus by Swedish pilots in a pro-democracy stunt.

On July 4, a single-engine plane piloted by two representatives of Sweden's public relations agency Studio Total invaded Belarus' airspace and dropped hundreds of teddy bears with "pro-free speech" signs on the town of Ivyanets and Minsk before flying back to Lithuania unhindered.