A Japanese man was sentenced to seven years in prison in Belarus for espionage activities.

The Minsk City Court has sentenced Japanese citizen Nakanishi Masatoshi to seven years in prison for carrying out espionage activities in Belarus. This was announced on March 17 by the press service of the Prosecutor General's Office of Belarus on the official website.

The statement notes that the court found him guilty of cooperating with the special services of a foreign state and performing actions deliberately aimed at harming the national security of Belarus.

It is specified that he was sentenced to seven years of imprisonment in a high-security penal colony with a fine of 500 basic units (about 580 thousand rubles).

The verdict has not yet entered into legal force and can be appealed on appeal, the publication says.

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The arrest of the Japanese intelligence agent who collected the data became known on September 4. According to media reports, he was interested in the socio-political situation in the country as a whole, as well as the process of implementing China's "One Belt— One Road" initiative.

Nakanishi himself said that the data could have been used by Ukraine or the United States for a potential missile attack on Belarus.