The last leaders’ dictatorship of Europe is facing an unprecedented challenge. Here’s what I could for Belarus Media

the leader serving Europe’s longest Alexander Lukashenko has long worked hard to seem invincible. It dominated past elections that the United States has neither considered free nor fair and give no dissent and protests suppression. Now, facing an unprecedented challenge, as he runs a former teacher and political novice for a sixth term as president of Belarus in the August 9 Svetlana Tikhanovskaya elections has emerged as his main rival, engaging Lukashenko’s overthrow regime and restore democracy. Tens of thousands of people in Belarus in some of the biggest opposition protests in the country in a decade, wrong under the mounting frustration over the management of the 19-COVID government crisis, combined with complaints about the shooting of ‘ economy. With reference to Lukashenko, the protesters chanted, stopping the cockroach ‘and held placards reading, change!’. “For the first time in his reign of 26 years, White Lukashenko, most do not support it,” says Aleksandr Feduta, a former adviser to the incumbent, who has been held captive for the support of an opposition candidate in 2010, told TIME. The United States, France, Germany and Poland have a say in Belarus called free and the right to secure elections, but analysts said it was unlikely to happen and expect Lukashenko to declare himself a winner by fraud and voting suffing says Katia Glod, an independent expert on Belarus. But it does not end its problems with a win. He will have to deal with the economic difficulties, growing discontent at home, reports the country’s thesis with Russia, as well as condemnation from west to handle when a crackdown on critics of. Who is Alexander Lukashenko? Lukashenko, a former collective farm director 65 years, since 1994 the nickname, last dictatorship in Europe ‘by the George W. Bush in 2005, the imprisoned opposition leader Lukashenko regime, ousted opinion has ruled the ex-Soviet country 9.5 million people surveys and held “heavy flawed” elections in the US and European Union sanctions arising from 2004. Belarus also the only country in Europe that the death penalty with the highest number of executions carried out by a blow to the head. The prisoners are not told when they performed and data on the death penalty is treated as a state secret, but were executed according to Amnesty International more than 400 people since the fall of the Soviet Union. Reliable opinion polls are hard to find, but a sociological survey of the Institute put Lukashenko’s approval rating at 24%. Analysts say this year Lukashenko has been weakened by the wrong COVID-19 crisis management, which he calls a “psychosis” that could be cured with a vodka and a sauna despite the recent contract the disease itself. He refused to impose a lockout against the virus, the more than 68,000 infected and killed 574 inhabitants, according to Johns Hopkins University. “The official line is that the virus does not exist and the Ministry of Health has more or less been forced to remain calm,” said Glod. “He has a lot of mistakes. People were left to cope with the crisis,” says Feduta. Dissatisfied smoldering for years. A decade of economic stagnation and the prospect of closer economic integration with Russia – as many as the Belarus sovereignty threaten – picture of Lukashenko has weakened as a guarantor of stability. Belarus continues to support its economy largely been controlled on the low cost of energy and Russian loans. But last year the Kremlin has increased pressure on Belarus, rising energy prices and cut subsidies. Russian officials said Minsk should accept a deeper economic integration, if they want to continue to benefit from a reduction in Russian energy prices. In recent years, Lukashenko has rejected a number of proposals from Moscow for closer integration and a single currency and common legislative initiatives, including. Who is Svetlana Tikhanovskaya? Tikhanovskaya, 38, occurred only after her husband, Sergei Tikhanovsky, a popular YouTube user rally led to regime, was arrested in May by the recording and locked. The Election Commission of Belarus has blocked two other political rival to run against the president. Viktor Babaryko was founded in June on what to say in prison his followers are fake fees and Valery Tsepkalo, the former ambassador of the country in Washington, who fled to Russia after alleged reports by security officials struck arrested and deprived of his rights parental. Amnesty International has called the men “political prisoners” who were persecuted for their political views. Tikhanovskaya their children to live abroad temporarily, after receiving threats that would have taken away if they have finished the race, said an opposition journalist. Along with Veronika Tsepkalo, the wife of Valery Tsepkalo and Maria Kolesnikova, Babaryko responsible Tikhanovskaya campaign supports record crowds gathered across the country their campaign of “one country for life” (the same name as her husband’s blog), which promises free political prisoners authoritarian tide back and new, running free elections within six months. happen “rarely protests outside Minsk. The fact that it shows nationwide is that people have a strong desire for change,” said Glod. Police responded with tactics typically heavy hand, more than 1,000 protesters to arrest this summer just after the group of Minsk-based Viasna human rights. As Russia is involved? In a dramatic turn in July 29 Belarus police arrested 33 men who claimed Russian mercenaries sent, the situation could be destabilized before the election. Then they threw Tikhanovskaya husband and another prominent critic, Mikola Statkevich, the mercenaries of cooperation. had in his fiery speech to the nation on August 4, Lukashenka claimed the detained men sent to Belarus confessed to “awaiting instructions”, and promised to protect the opponents of Belarus by foreign forces represented as “puppet masters”. Russia denied any involvement with the imprisoned men who claimed investigators the Wagner group members have been controlled by a military contractor reportedly an ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, the foreign policy of Moscow’s goals in Ukraine, Syria, Libya and it promotes various other countries. Maria Zakharova, spokeswoman for the Russian Foreign Ministry said on August 4, there is no evidence of the guilt of the accused men and Belarus a show before production vote. Wagner mercenaries often pass through Minsk, allegedly on their way to Sudan, Syria, Libya and other countries, says Matthew Frear, a Belarus expert at the University of Leiden in the Netherlands, calling the arrest a “stunt” Lukashenko as protectors Belarus has threatened to withdraw. “Putin does not like Lukashenko at all. But I would say that Putin would tend to weaken a time in power to see Lukashenko, as the unknown of protests or revolution,” he says. “It ‘been intimidating voters conducted with the view and open a new criminal case against opposition leaders jailed,” said Glod. Which could mean the results of Belarus and the rest of Europe? The fight Lukashenko will not end with his almost certain victory in the fraudulent elections. The protesters have no intention down the fuse, says Glod, “The momentum is and people are really ready for change.” However Feduta warns that the regime is ready to use force to bring to silence dissent, A weakened Lukashenko will find it much harder to resist Kremlin influence. “If it’s to suppress dissent, but also lose the ability to transform into the West so that no choice but to work with Moscow,” said Frear. The increase in support for Tikhanovskaya has made it clear that the Belarusians looking further west than in the east, said Glod. “They want democracy, rule of law and European values. Belarus is not a backward country, as it was perceived as yet. The Lukashenko regime collapsing one way or another. Until then, the European Union is next a country experienced a deep political crisis live, “he says.
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