Belarusian media accused Protasevich of fighting along with the Ukrainian ultra-nationalist Azov Battalion. According to the BBC, the "pro-Lukashenko press in Belarus has portrayed the dissident journalist as an extremist with right-wing sympathies". Protasevich said in 2020 that he had spent a year in Ukraine covering the war in Donbas as a freelancing photojournalist. Azov Battalion founder Andriy Biletsky wrote about Protasevich, "Roman was indeed together with Azov and other military units that fought against the occupation of Ukraine, though his weapon as a journalist wasn’t an automatic rifle but the written word", and that he was wounded at the 2015 Shyrokyne standoff.