The BSSF was founded in August 2020 to assist athletes who faced pressure, intimidation or exclusion for opposing the disputed re-election of Belarus' authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko which sparked widespread protests and a subsequent crackdown by the authorities.

In December last year, the Minsk City Court found Herasimenia and Apeikin guilty of actions aimed at harming Belarus' national security and sentenced both to 12-years in jail.

Belarus' Supreme Court has dismissed an appeal against this verdict.

When the original decision was announced, Herasimenia, a three-time Olympic swimming medallist and former women's 100 metres freestyle world champion, had mocked it on social media.

"We looked at the verdict, laughed," Herasimenia, currently in exile in Poland, wrote on Twitter. 

"As they say, you can even shoot me in absentia!"

BSSF chief executive Apeikin, a former head of sponsorship for the 2019 European Games in Minsk, has also fled to Poland, which borders Belarus.

Concerns over the treatment of dissident athletes in Belarus came to the fore at the re-arranged Olympic Games in Tokyo, where sprinter Krystsina Tsimanouskaya was forced to miss her 200m race after alleging she was taken to the airport against her will following public criticism of the national team's coaches.

Athletics head coach at Tokyo 2020 Yury Maisevich was recently charged by the Athletics Integrity Unit with acting without integrity and in bad faith, and Tsimanouskaya has defected to Poland and become a full citizen there.

Tsimanouskaya recently claimed that she had received "zero" support from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) since landing in Poland.

The National Olympic Committee of the Republic of Belarus (NOCRB) has been hit by several sanctions short of suspension by the IOC, and it does not recognise the election of Viktor Lukashenko, the son of Alexander Lukashenko, as President.

Belarus' athletes have been largely frozen out of international sport because of Alexander Lukashenko's support for his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in the war in Ukraine, but the NOCRB has continued to avoid suspension.

The IOC is exploring a pathway for the return of Russian and Belarusian athletes to international competitions, but the BSSF has argued its insistence that this would be under "strict conditions" of neutrality is "insufficient".

It has also argued "Belarusian free athletes should be granted the right to participate in sports competitions and saved from persecution by the Lukashenko regime for their civic position".