Ukrainian Volunteer Missing In Belarus To Be Tried For Espionage

The woman stopped contacting her relatives in the summer of 2023.

43-year-old Ukrainian volunteer Natalya Zakharenko, with whom contact was lost back in July 2023, is accused of espionage (Article 358 of the Criminal Code), writes nashaniva.com.

Hearings in the case will begin on February 15 in the Homel Regional Court. Details of the charges are unknown. As journalists write, the woman stopped communicating on July 19, 2023, “almost immediately after she arrived in Belarus.” In August of the same year, the mother of the accused told the Ukrainian portal “Chas Chernigivsky” about the disappearance of her daughter.

The media writes that Zakharenko traveled to Belarus even before the start of a full-scale war in Ukraine to trade in Homel markets. After February 2022, she began helping refugees from Ukraine. In other people’s phones, her number was signed as “Natalya carrier from Ukraine”, “Natalya parcels”, “Natalya documents”, “carrier to the Republic of Belarus” and so on.

Together with Zakharenko, Larisa Krupa is involved in the case, who is accused of “failure to report a crime” (Article 406 of the Criminal Code).