How one persecuted Belarusian journalist found safe haven in Montenegro – interview with Iryna Khalip

Iryna Khalip is a prominent Belarusian journalist who has spent her career exposing corruption and human rights abuses, often at great personal risk. Her investigative reporting on political and social issues in Belarus has made her a target of state persecution.

In 2010, after participating in post-election protests, Khalip was arrested and later handed a two-year suspended prison sentence. Over the years, she faced detentions, smear campaigns, and even threats to her family, but she remained committed to her work.

In recent years, Khalip has been living in Montenegro, where she continues to report on Belarusian affairs and advocate for human rights.

“The immigration changes everything in your life, but I think that for journalists it can be a new chance and a new opportunity to expand their professional life,” Khalip told The Fix in an interview.

Since going into exile in 2020, Khalip has continued her reporting for the Latvia-based Novaya Gazeta Europe. From Montenegro, she remains dedicated to exposing government abuses in Belarus. 

She regularly reports from Montenegro about the status of the political prisoners in Belarus, about asylum seekers in EU countries, especially Poland, and abuses of Alexander Lukashenko’s regime. 

Her investigative work from the exile included revealing leaked diplomatic documents and negotiations of the Belarus government. Recently, Khalip started partnering with local investigative journalists to expose Russian influence in Montenegro.  

But she admits that professionally it is not easy to work from exile. It is a big challenge to maintain a network of contacts, sources, everything that entails regular journalistic work, including face-to-face meetings. Exile creates new limits on what stories can be produced. 

“For example, you can choose only those speakers… who are not in Belarus because of their safety. Some persons can be persecuted for interviews with you, for the comment for your article. So you should exclude them from your list of speakers, but you find new people in the new country, new immigrant people,” she said.

Khalip advises journalists in exile that the key thing is to work hard to try to create new contacts – first with other immigrants around the region because that can expand insight and new opportunities for journalism. Also, with local journalists and media in the country of exile.

Also, an important lesson on exiled journalism, according to Khalip, is maintaining and creating new contacts with media organisations worldwide – with someone that could be alarmed when something important is happening in her home country.  

Khalip is 57 years old – she was born in Minsk, Belarus and graduated with a degree in journalism at the time when the Soviet Union was in its last days. She began her career at the state-run newspaper Sovetskaya Belorussiya (“Soviet Belarus”). In 1994, following editorial conflicts due to increasing governmental control over the media, she resigned to join independent outlets.

Throughout her career, Khalip has faced significant persecution for her investigative journalism, particularly her work on governmental corruption and human rights abuses. While reporting for Belorusskaya Delovaya Gazeta (“Belarusian Business Newspaper”), her articles led to governmental harassment, including detentions and threats, culminating in the newspaper's suspension in 2003. 

Khalip’s personal life intertwines with her activism. She is married to Andrei Sannikov, a former Belarusian presidential candidate and opposition figure. Both were actively involved in the protests following the disputed 2010 presidential election. On December 19, 2010, during a peaceful demonstration, they were brutally beaten and arrested by security forces. 

She was detained in a KGB facility, placed under house arrest, and faced threats regarding the custody of her young son. In May 2011, she received a two-year suspended prison sentence on charges related to organising activities disruptive to public order.

Despite these challenges, Khalip’s commitment to press freedom and human rights has been internationally recognised. 

TIME magazine honored her in their 2005 special issue “European Heroes” under the “Brave Hearts” category. In 2009, she received the Courage in Journalism Award from the International Women’s Media Foundation. 

Regarding the current state of journalism in Belarus, Khalip said that independent journalists are either imprisoned or in exile, leaving no free media within the country. 

“In Belarus, we have about 40 journalists in prisons and all other media and journalists were pressed to run away to exile,” Khalip said.

Despite the global focus on other crises, Khalip highlighted the importance of keeping Belarus in the international media spotlight, creating new contacts with exiled journalists, politicians, and human rights activists.

“I think each exiled journalist went through some desperation and depression phase. But then you understand that now you are completely free. So you don't think about possible persecution, about criminal cases, about possible imprisonment. It gives you a [second wind],” Khalip concluded.  

Source of the cover photo: courtesy of Iryna Khalip