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Assembled protesters waved historical Belarusian flags, carried photos of detained Belarusian opponents and posters directed against authoritarian leader Aliaksandr Lukashenko.
Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Cichanouskaya delivered a speech at the event, who staged the action exactly one year after her husband Siarhei Cichanouski was arrested for running for president.
Cichanouskaya, who ran for her husband in last year’s election, recalled the day S. Cichanouski was arrested.
“I was at home that day, watching the detention live with the children. I was in shock, I didn’t know what to do next, “the Belarusian opposition leader told the people gathered in Lukiškės square.
He says “in every meeting, in every interview” that the regime has carried out a real occupation and that 9 million Belarusians are in danger.
“The last week has become a catalyst for the reaction of the whole world.” Different countries are launching investigations, imposing sanctions on the regime and expressing their support for plans to help Belarus, “Cichanouskaya said.
Several members of the Lithuanian Seimas also addressed the event. After the event in Lukiškės square, the campaign participants intend to move to the Belarusian Embassy in Vilnius.
A wave of massive protests across Belarus that lasted for months after the presidential elections last August. Lukashenko, who has led Belarus since 1994, has announced a sixth term. The opposition and Western democracies view the elections as rigged.
The European Union and the United States have imposed sanctions on the authoritarian leader and several people around him, freezing their assets and prohibiting them from entering.
Historic protests in which at least four people were killed have now subsided, but journalists and activists continue to be detained and tried.
A new wave of Western outrage against the Minsk regime was sparked by the forced landing of the Athens-Vilnius passenger plane in Minsk and the arrest of Sofia Sapega, a student of opposition journalist Ramanas Pratasevičius and her friend at the European University of Humanities in Vilnius.
