Protests break out in wake of Belarus presidential vote

Investing

Belarusian riot police cracked down on opponents of strongman Alexander Lukashenko on Sunday night, using tear gas and stun grenades to disperse protests that broke out in the wake of a contentious presidential election.

An official exit poll put Mr Lukashenko on course to win 79.7 per cent of the vote, while his main rival, Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, who has drawn large crowds at rallies around the country, was forecast to win just 6.8 per cent.

No Belarusian presidential election this century has been judged free and fair by international observers, and Sunday’s vote was overshadowed by a rapidly escalating crackdown after polls closed, as well as the detention of several of Ms Tikhanovskaya’s team on the eve of the vote on Saturday.

Some of the most intense clashes took place in the capital Minsk, where huge numbers of police who had cordoned off streets and squares earlier in the day faced off against thousands of opposition supporters who took to the streets after voting closed chanting “Leave!” to Mr Lukashenko.

A couple rides a scooter past a wall of riot police blocking a street in Minsk after the presidential election © Reuters

Activists said police used batons, flash grenades, tear gas and water cannon to disperse protesters, and that many protesters had been detained and others injured. Social media footage showed bloodied protesters being treated by medics.

Protests and detentions also took place in other cities including Brest and Vitebsk. Internet access was widely disrupted across the country, and activists said problems persisted on Monday morning.

Mr Lukashenko, a former collective-farm boss, has ruled the former Soviet republic for 26 years, earning the sobriquet of Europe’s “last dictator” for his ruthless suppression of dissent.

But despite the fact that two of his main rivals had been jailed ahead of Sunday’s election, and a third is in exile, the 65-year-old faced an unexpectedly strong challenge from Ms Tikhanovskaya, a 37-year-old former teacher and wife of one of the jailed men.

The political novice, who was allowed to run in her husband’s stead, has toured the country, drawing crowds in both small towns and big cities — such as Minsk, where one rally attracted 63,000 people, a figure local activists say was the largest since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.

Ms Tikhanovskaya tapped into widespread discontent with Belarus’s stagnating economy, as well as anger at Mr Lukashenko’s refusal to introduce any form of social distancing to fight coronavirus, which he has dismissed as a “psychosis” treatable by drinking vodka or driving a tractor.

“People are very angry at Lukashenko for lots of things. Some people for the reform of pensions, some people for the education system,” said Olga Katach, an activist from Vitebsk. “[But] Covid was the red button that started the . . . political mobilisation of people. People understood that the situation is dangerous for them, and that they have to react.”

Belarus, with a population of 9.5m, has recorded more than 68,000 cases of Covid-19. Neighbouring Poland, with four times the population, has reported only 51,000 cases.

As support for Ms Tikhanovskaya built in the run-up to Sunday’s vote, Mr Lukashenko ratcheted up the pressure on his opponents, who he claims are backed by unnamed foreign “puppetmasters”.

Last month, Belarus arrested 33 Russian mercenaries it accused of working with Ms Tikhanovskaya’s husband to “destabilise the situation” ahead of the elections.

On Saturday, Ms Tikhanovskaya’s campaign manager and six other staff were detained, while another key ally, Maria Kolesnikova, was also briefly held. A third, Veronika Tsepkalo, fled the country on Sunday, fearing for her safety.

Opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya places her vote on Sunday © Sergei Grits/AP

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko arrives at a polling station in Minsk © Tatyana Senkovich/EPA-EFE

As he cast his ballot on Sunday morning, Mr Lukashenko told state media that he would work to prevent “chaos or some sort of clashes, conflict or civil war” from breaking out.

“As [Russian president Vladimir] Putin told me the other day: we’re in the same boat, and we’ll both drown if they rock it,” he said.

Local activists say that more than 1,300 people have been arrested since May for participating in peaceful protests. Belarusian authorities also prevented Ms Tikhanovskaya from holding rallies in the final days before the election and cancelled a football match she planned to attend after fans chanted protest slogans at another game.

Two DJs who played “We Want Changes”, a rock protest anthem from the time of the collapse of the USSR, at a state-sponsored concert earlier this week that Ms Tikhanovskaya’s supporters gatecrashed were jailed for 10 days.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *