This is a system of non-public bans operating entirely outside any legal framework. It does not rely on official lists or court decisions. Instead, it functions through verbal orders, anonymous “commissions,” and an atmosphere of all-pervasive fear. It is a “phantom list” that cannot be challenged, because formally it does not exist. Books simply disappear from library and bookstore shelves, from school curricula and prison libraries, leaving no paper trail.
This mechanism is a deliberate state policy aimed at cleansing the cultural and intellectual space of the country. Its goal is to erase alternative historical narratives, suppress national identity, silence critical voices, and — most importantly — instill deep self-censorship, where fear becomes an internal editor for every writer, publisher, and even reader.
Below, we will highlight where and how this censorship operates, which books and authors fall victim to it, and what consequences it brings for Belarusian society.
Part 1. The zone of prohibition
Informal bans are enforced across various spaces — from public to highly restricted ones — demonstrating the total nature of the state’s control over the printed word. Each of these locations becomes a battleground for the right to knowledge, memory, and free expression.
Libraries and bookstores
One of the main targets of this purge is public libraries and bookstores, including even secondhand shops. The mechanism for removing books is honed down to the smallest detail and relies on suddenness and anonymity. “Commissions” arrive at these institutions, and their composition is typically unknown. The people conducting these inspections do not identify themselves or present any official orders, acting on the basis of unpublished authority backed by fear of consequences for noncompliance. Their instructions are delivered orally: library and bookstore staff are ordered to immediately “write off” and “dispose of” the unwanted literature. The absence of written directives makes the process entirely opaque and strips away any possibility of formal appeal — because there is no document to contest. This tactic turns cultural workers into accomplices in the destruction of their own heritage.
A vivid example comes from a gymnasium in Brest, where, following a visit by such a “commission,” the director instructed staff to backdate the write-off of 1990s history textbooks to the previous day, creating the illusion of a scheduled procedure and concealing the fact that the books were removed due to censorship.
In addition to anonymous “commissions,” the system also uses and encourages reports from pro-government activists. For example, after such complaints, certain books were removed from the shelves of the “OZ” bookstore chain. This shows how the state harnesses “bottom-up initiative” to legitimize its repressive actions.
These tactics provoke preemptive self-censorship: to avoid trouble, employees begin removing any books from the shelves that might seem “questionable.” In this way, fear and uncertainty become the primary engines of censorship, expanding its reach far beyond explicit orders.
Removal from the school curriculum
The state pays special attention to the education system, aiming to instill in the younger generation a single “correct” worldview — as defined by those in power.
One public example is the removal from the 11th-grade school curriculum of Uładzimir Karatkievič’s novel “The Ears of Rye Under Your Sickle” — a foundational work dedicated to the emergence of Belarusian national consciousness in the 19th century and the 1863 uprising. It’s worth noting that the authorities did not even attempt to conceal the ideological motives behind this decision. The director of the National Library, Vadim Gigin, who initiated the removal, openly stated that the novel does not contribute to cultivating the kind of historical memory the state wants schoolchildren to have. This is an explicit admission that education in Belarus is not seen as a process of knowledge acquisition, but as a tool of ideological indoctrination. Another example is the removal of the poem “In the City Rules Rahvalod” by Aleś Razanaŭ from the supplementary reading section.
Other prominent authors have suffered a similar fate. Works by Nobel laureate Svetlana Alexievich — whose writing explores the traumas of Soviet and post-Soviet life — and by Alexander Solzhenitsyn, author of “The Gulag Archipelago”, have disappeared from the Russian literature curriculum.
These actions cannot be viewed as mere adjustments to the educational plan. They are a long-term investment in the regime’s stability. By removing works that teach critical thinking, expose the crimes of totalitarianism, and nurture a Belarusian identity independent of the pro-Russian narrative, the authorities aim to raise a generation deprived of intellectual tools for analyzing reality and resisting dictatorship.
Part 2. Who and what is being banned
An analysis of informally banned books allows us to sketch a profile of the “enemy” as perceived by the Lukashenka regime. This is not a random assortment — it is a systematic persecution of specific themes, ideas, and names that the current government considers threatening.
“Unreliable” authors
Writers of all calibers appear on the “phantom list,” but they share one thing in common: their work does not fit within the framework of state ideology. At the forefront are Nobel Prize laureates Svetlana Alexievich and Aleś Bialacki. whose international recognition only intensifies the regime’s irritation.
Bans also target contemporary authors who openly criticize the regime. For example, on August 4, 2025, it became known that Saša Filipienka’s new novel “The Elephant” had been pulled from sale. In response, the author made it freely available online.
The voice of conscience: the war on human rights literature
A separate front in this war is the destruction of human rights literature. These books and reports pose a particular threat to the regime because they don’t merely express opinions — they methodically document crimes.
The publications of the Human Rights Center Viasna have faced systematic persecution. Even before the organization was officially designated an “extremist formation,” its materials began to disappear from public access. Annual reviews and chronicles of human rights violations in Belarus, along with the Right to Freedom bulletin — which had been regularly added to the National Library’s collection since 1998 — were removed from the electronic catalog, making them inaccessible to researchers and readers.
One of the authorities’ greatest targets of hatred is so-called prison literature — works written behind bars by political prisoners: Pavieł Sieviaryniec, Aleś Bialacki, Ihar Alinievič, Mikałaj Dziadok, Maksim Znak. This is censorship squared — an attempt to silence the voices of those already deprived of freedom, to prevent their testimonies from breaking through the prison walls.
A textbook example is the story of Aleś Bialacki’s book “Enlightened by Belarusianhood”. In 2013, 40 copies of the essay collection, published in Vilnius, were seized at the border. Later, in February 2014, the Ashmiany District Court banned the book’s import into Belarus. The justification for the ban was a line in the preface stating that there is no independent judiciary in the country. The judge made the decision based solely on their “personal conviction,” clearly illustrating how flimsy quasi-legal reasoning is used to mask politically motivated censorship.
The destruction of human rights literature is not simply a fight against dissent — it is an attempt to erase evidence. Reports by human rights defenders are not fiction; they are a carefully compiled archive of state crimes. The removal of these documents from libraries and public access is a preemptive strike against future justice. The goal is to make the work of future historians and investigators as difficult as possible, depriving them of primary sources and documentary evidence.
Control over the past ensures control over the present and the future. That is why historical literature offering perspectives that differ from the official one has become a frequent target of informal bans.
The main targets are textbooks and history books published in the 1990s — a period of national revival, democratic hopes, and the formation of a historical narrative centered on Belarus’s European identity and its centuries-long struggle for independence. This era is now officially declared a “mistake.” These books present a version of history that fundamentally contradicts today’s neo-Soviet and pro-Russian ideology, and therefore are subject to eradication.
Classics under prohibition
Repression is not limited to contemporary authors. Founding figures of Belarusian literature have also become targets: Janka Kupała, Jakub Kołas, Uładzimir Karatkievič, Vasil Bykaŭ, Vincent Dunin-Marcinkievič, and Francišak Bahuševič. Their works, which for decades formed the core of the national cultural code, are now considered dangerous in some cases. Beyond being removed or replaced in school curricula and erased from correctional facility libraries, there are also bans on theatrical productions based on these classics. For instance, the play “The Locals” based on Janka Kupała’s work has been banned multiple times.
The reason is that the works of these renowned authors are the foundation of modern Belarusian identity and language — which the regime now equates with disloyalty and opposition.
Conclusions
The system of informal censorship in Belarus is not just about limiting access to information. Its ultimate result is not merely the number of books that have been removed, but the number of books that will never be written, published, or read.
And yet, even under these conditions, society finds ways to resist. The role of digital archives, electronic libraries, and independent online platforms has grown significantly. They preserve forbidden knowledge and provide access to books exiled from physical space. The sharing of texts via the internet, samizdat, or hand-to-hand distribution has become a form of civil disobedience. It is a way to maintain a connection with genuine national culture, with truthful history, and with a world of free thought.
As long as there are people willing to read, remember, and share this knowledge, the regime will not succeed in fully realizing its plan to establish total control — not only over bodies, but over the minds of its citizens.