Sasja Filipenko on Belarus and Russia

Sasja Filipenko is a dissident writer and journalist from Belarus. For years, he presented a popular talk show in Russia, where he used satire to oppose Putin. In 2020, he took his opposition to the streets of his home country and became one of the main faces of the mass protests against Lukashenko. Unable to live in Russia or Belarus, he became a novelist and playwright. Tonight, Filipenko will speak truth to power, about using art as a political weapon and the ways the Soviet past still influences Belarus and Russia today. 

Filipenko’s novels are gripping and give a biting critique of politics. He sharply analyses the power structures within the former Soviet Union. In Red Crosses, which is newly translated into Dutch as ‘Uitgewist’ he dives into the past and examines the hold the Soviet past has on the present. He tells a story of how individual lives can be broken by the grand events of history, and about the fight against the erasure of that history.

Olaf Koens is a Dutch journalist and author. He has been a reporter in Russia and the former Soviet Union, as well as a Middle East correspondent. He has reported on revolutions and wars, looking for small stories that provide insight.