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Protestants and insurgent police have clashed in Belarus’ capital Minsk and other cities, after a state election poll on TV said long-term leader Alexander Lukashenko was re-elected in Sunday’s election.
In Minsk, police used stung grenades to disperse crowds in the city center. There are reports of injuries.
The question of the state TV exit showed that Mr Lukashenko won almost 80% of the vote.
Main opposition candidate Svetlana Tikhanovskaya said she did not trust the figures that gave her 7%.
“I believe my eyes, and I see that the majority is with us,” she said at a news conference on Sunday night.
The opposition had said it expected the vote to be rigged, saying it would hold an alternative count of the votes.
Mrs Tikhanovskaya, 37, ran in the election instead of her husband who was imprisoned and went on to win major opposition matches.
Mr Lukashenko, who has been in power since 1994, has promised that the situation in the country will remain “under control”.
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The lead-up to Sunday’s question-and-answer session saw an attack on activists and journalists amid the country’s largest opposition demonstrations in years.
What is happening in Belarus now?
In Minsk, reports were made late Sunday of the Minsk-Hero City monument in the city center.
Witnesses and correspondents said insurgent police used rubber bullets and a water cannon to disperse protesters.
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Reuters
Protestants say President Lukashenko should step down
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Reuters
A number of people were arrested Sunday night
Several ambulances were seen running to the scene.
Footage has emerged of protesters fighting police in the capital, and media reports say a number of people have been arrested.
Referring to Mr. Lukashenko, crowds in the streets sang “Go away!”
Similar protests are set to begin tonight in Brest and Zhodino.
Internet monitoring group NetBlocks previously said that relations in Belarus were “significantly disrupted”, with the situation getting worse by the day and creating an “information vacuum”.
What is the context?
Sometimes referred to as the last dictator of Europe, President Lukashenko, 65, was first elected in 1994.
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EPA
Mr. Lukashenko cast his ballot at a polling station in Minsk
In the last vote in 2015, he was declared the winner with 83.5% of the vote. There were no serious challengers and election observers reported problems in counting and tabulating votes.
This year’s election is being held amid growing signs of frustration with his leadership.
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EPA
Svetlana Tikhanovskaya has emerged as the wild card of the race
The campaign saw the rise of Ms Tikhanovskaya, a former teacher whose mother was a stay-at-home mom, until she came into the political spotlight.
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After her husband was arrested and blocked from registering for the vote, she stepped in to take his place.
In the run-up to the elections, she told the BBC that people in Belarus did not believe the elections would be conducted fairly.
“But I still believe our president will understand that his time is over. People don’t want him anymore,” she said.
President Lukashenko dismissed Ms. Tikhanovskaya as a “poor little girl”, manipulated by foreign “puppet masters”.
Tens of thousands last month defeated an escalating attack on the opposition to attend a protest in the capital Minsk, the largest such demonstration in a decade.
More than 2,000 people have been arrested since the start of the election campaign in May, according to Human Rights Center Viasna.
On the eve of the vote, Tikhanovskaya’s team said their campaign manager had been arrested and would not be released until Monday.
And on Sunday, when people voted, Internet service was “significantly disrupted”, according to online monitor NetBlocks. Opposition leaders say this makes it harder to gather and share evidence of election fraud.
There were already concerns about a lack of control because observers were not invited to control the elections and more than 40% of the votes were cast before election day.
Did anyone else run?
There were three other candidates:
- Anna Kanopatskaya, a former MP who won a rare seat for the opposition in the 2016 parliamentary elections
- Sergei Cherechen, leader of the Social Democratic Party
- Andrei Dmitriyev, co-chair of the Tell the Truth movement, a campaign group raided by authorities
Two key opposition figures were prevented from running and threw their weight behind Ms Tikhanovskaya’s campaign.
One of them, Valery Tsepkalo, fled Belarus before the match, for fear of arrest. His wife Veronika stayed behind and became an important campaigner for Mrs. Tikhanovskaya.
It emerged on Sunday that Ms Tsepkalo had now left Belarus for Moscow, for “security” reasons.
Anger against Mr Lukashenko’s government is fueled in part by the response to coronavirus.
The president has downplayed the outbreak, advising citizens to drink vodka and use saunas to fight the disease.
Belarus, with a population of 9.5 million, has had nearly 70,000 confirmed cases and 600 deaths.
