After the Belarusian regime passed a sweeping new law earlier this year banning “LGBTQ propaganda,” it took less than two weeks to designate Jane Baziuk an “extremist”.
It didn’t matter that Baziuk was now living in Poland, or that they had been actively trying to keep a low profile.
Since leaving Brest in 2022 to move to Poland, Baziuk had been volunteering for a youth educational initiative and sharing queer content on their social media. For two years, they – Baziuk is non-binary and uses they/them pronouns – had managed to stay beneath the radar, or so they thought. Then a friend saw their name on the news.
“At first, I didn’t even believe it,” Baziuk told The i Paper. An updated list of “extremist formations” had mentioned Baziuk’s name. No one informed them officially about the designation.
Baziuk feared for their family, who had remained in Belarus, and warned them about the possibility of being searched or questioned by security forces.
