Belarus-3
Belarusian state-owned television channel
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Belarus 3 (Belarusian: Беларусь 3) is a state-owned television channel in Belarus.
| |
| Country | Belarus |
|---|---|
| Broadcast area | Belarus |
| Headquarters | Minsk, Belarus |
| Programming | |
| Languages | Russian, Belarusian |
| Picture format | 1080i (16:9 HDTV) |
| Ownership | |
| Owner | National State Television and Radio Company of the Republic of Belarus |
| Sister channels | Belarus 1 Belarus 2 Belarus 4 Belarus 5 Belarus 24 NTV Belarus The First News Channel |
| History | |
| Launched | 8 March 2013 |
| Links | |
| Website | https://www.3belarus.by |
| Availability | |
| Terrestrial | |
| DTT MUX 01 | Channel 8 |
| Streaming media | |
| tvr.by | Watch live |
Created by Belteleradio in 2013, it is a cultural channel, broadcasting in both Russian and Belarusian languages.
History
With the growing Russification of Belarus, more Belarusian-language programming gradually moved from the First Channel to its second network Lad, which, at launch in 2003, provided a limited amount of Belarusian programming.[1]
Belarus-3 was announced by BTRC in February 2012; the initial goal was to test the channel in March.[2]
The channel started broadcasting on 7:50a.m. on 8 February 2013 airing the ATN (Agency for Televisio News, a BTRC unit) documentary Horackija pacechi from the Zjamlja belaruskaja cycle. Most programs were cultural in nature; Kalyhanka, formerly of Belarus-1, moved to this channel as a result of its launch and expanded from five nights a week to seven.[3] As of 2018, Belarusian-language programming accounted for 32% of the weekly total, an average of over five hours a day.[4]
What set Belarus-3 apart from the other BTRC channels was the fact that it became the first digital-only channel to be launched by the corporation. At the time of launching, 96% of Belarusians were within the reach of the digital terrestrial platform (moreover, Belarus was in a transitional phase to digital).[5] In 2017, the channel adopted a new graphics package and, in early 2018, in a special program for its fifth anniversary, announced that it would start broadcasting in HD soon.[4]
In September 2020, an episode of Kalyhanka featured a story about a bear (Top) who deposed a fox (Yana) from the throne. Local bloggers considered it to be a satire of how Alexander Lukashenko got into power.[6]
As of January 2023, nearly 850,000 viewers watched the channel daily.[7]