The Supreme Administrative Court of Lithuania has upheld the decision not to grant asylum to Olga Karach, a prominent Belarusian activist who heads the Nash Dom (Our House) NGO.
Neringa Lukoševičienė, the court’s spokeswoman, told BNS that the court upheld a ruling by a lower court dismissing the appeal.
Karach’s appeal against the lower court’s ruling to uphold the Migration Department’s decision not to grant her asylum in Lithuania was heard by a three-judge panel.
Lukoševičienė did not comment on the reasons for the Supreme Administrative Court’s judgement, which is final and cannot be appealed, noting that asylum cases are examined behind closed doors.
The Migration Department denied Karach asylum last August, citing the State Security Department’s report. The intelligence agency claimed Karach was a national security threat due to her alleged ties with Russian intelligence.
However, the migration body then granted the activist a temporary residence permit in Lithuania on humanitarian grounds, which can be extended.
Karach has confirmed that she was approached by the State Security Department’s officers last spring over her ties to Russian intelligence, but she refrained from elaborating further on this issue.
The activist, who has been receiving residence permits in Lithuania since 2014, applied for asylum last year.
Nash Dom says it provides humanitarian, psychological and other kinds of assistance to Belarusians both in their homeland and in Lithuania, and also monitors human rights violations in the neighbouring country.
The organisation was declared extremist by the Minsk government in 2022. Karach was put on the “terrorist list” by the Belarusian KGB in 2021.
Newsletter
Every Friday morning.
