Former political prisoners from several Belarusian penal colonies told Novaya-Europe that after the start of the full-scale war, prison industries began fulfilling orders linked to the Russian army. According to them, inmates were involved in such work in Novopolotsk, Bobruisk, Vitebsk, Mogilev, Shklov and Ivatsevichi.
A source from Colony No. 22 in Ivatsevichi said that in 2022 its woodworking shop, which had previously supplied export markets, switched to making crates for rocket shells. He said up to 300 crates were shipped out daily, each about three meters long and priced at 150 Belarusian rubles. He also claims that some of the metal fittings arrived with Russian markings from Perm.
Former inmates from other colonies confirmed that woodworking shops moved to producing ammunition crates after the invasion. In Colony No. 3, Vitba, Maksim Vinyarsky said coffins were also produced there at the same time and, in his view, may have been used in funerals for participants in the war.
In Mogilev’s Colony No. 15, according to Andrei Voinich, large volumes of plastic funeral flowers were manufactured and sent to Russia. In the same Colony No. 22, another former inmate said an urgent order for 500 single-tier beds arrived in early 2023; he says the packaging stated they were made for Russia’s Defense Ministry.
Witnesses say sewing shops began running three shifts from late 2023 and into 2024 to make camouflage uniforms and pouches for military first-aid kits. A former inmate from Bobruisk says those items were intended specifically for the Russian army. In Vitebsk, Vinyarsky said, there was also a large order for 700,000 heavy kraft-paper envelopes.
“When the big military orders arrived, all the foremen were ‘put in green,’” Maksim Vinyarsky said, adding that industrial staff were reclassified as internal service military personnel.
The sources also described hazardous work in low-skilled labor shops, where old cables were stripped for metal and, they say, lead was melted and plastic burned outdoors without filters or protective equipment.