Authorities in Belarus say President Alexander Lukashenko has won 80.1 percent of the vote in a poll that many believe was rigged.
A crowd of people from the CNN team in Minsk marched on tens of thousands of people marching through the capital on Friday in revolt against dictator Lukashenko, who has ruled the country for 26 years.
Protests have erupted in Belarus this week, sometimes erupting in violence, with some protesters claiming they have been beaten and humiliated by security services.
Officials in Belarus say 6,700 people have been arrested and at least one person killed in the aftermath of the election, which independent observers have criticized as not free or fair.
Authorities have now released more than 2,000 people amid ongoing protests, according to a Friday statement from the Interior Ministry.
Opposition groups claim that the election was humiliated by widespread ballot papers and fraud to keep Lukashenko in power, while the independent monitoring group “Honest People” said that according to his data Tikhanovskaya had won in at least 80 polling stations in Belarus.
Tikhanovskaya, who fled to Lithuania after the vote, called on mayors on Friday to organize peaceful protests this weekend, urging her supporters to sign an online petition demanding that they cast a vote, with the presence of independent observers. .
Several people arrested for participating in mass protests in Belarus claim that the country’s security forces beat, tortured and humiliated them while in government.
Lukashenko claimed earlier this week that the protests were initiated by “foreign puppets” and added that the legislation would not be repealed and maintained that he still enjoys widespread support.
However, the allegations of torture appear to have angered the government.
There were already signs this week of the country’s army and police apparently turning against Lukashenko and showing support for the opposition. A video posted on Instagram by a man named Evgeny Novitski shows his brother – a former special forces officer – throwing his uniform in a trash can, saying he is no longer proud of his job.
“Hello everyone! I took an oath to my people, and look at what is happening in Minsk, I can not be proud of where I have served, and so I can no longer keep this uniform at home,” said the former officer.
Another video posted by Belarussian TV station Nexta shows a police officer named Ivan Kolos saying he refuses to “follow criminal orders.” He urged his colleagues not to point guns at peaceful people and instead be with them. He said he would take orders from Tikhanovskaya, not from Lukashenko.
The growing call prompted some Belarusian authorities late on Thursday to apologize, a reversal of their previous rhetoric that promised a harsh response to Protestants.
“I want to take full responsibility and apologize in a humane way to these people … I am not a bloodthirsty person and I do not want violence,” Belarusian Interior Minister Yuri Karaev said in an interview with a state TV channel ONT. .
Karaev also referred to the use of force against journalists, saying that he “is against any violence against journalists, but this does not mean you have to climb between the two sides, do not go into the thick of it!”
CNN’s Emma Reynolds contributed to this report.
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