[ad_1]
On Sunday, “a decision was made to announce two diplomats from the British embassy as persona non grata,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Anatoly Hlaz said.
Belarusian television ONT reported that these diplomats have already left the country.
The channel mentioned that Lisa Thumwood, deputy head of the UK mission in Belarus, and Timothy Wight-Boycott, defense attaché, had been dispatched.
Citing police sources, the ONT reported that these diplomats were gathering information about the opposition protests in Belarus for three months and the general political situation in the country.
British diplomats have repeatedly met with representatives of non-governmental and human rights organizations, television said.
Mr. Hlaz has yet to comment on these reports.
Belarus has been hit by unprecedented mass protests by opposition supporters since the controversial presidential election on August 9. The most massive of them are usually held on Sundays, with tens of thousands of people taking to the streets of Minsk and other cities to protest against the re-election of authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko, who has led the country for more than two decades and has been manipulated. by the Belarusian opposition and western democracies.
In late September, the UK and Canada became the first major states to impose sanctions on Lukashenko.
Sanctions were imposed on Lukashenko himself, his son and key figures of the Minsk regime for alleged human rights violations.
Last month, Britain expressed solidarity with a string of Central and Eastern European countries, including the Baltic states, which withdrew their ambassadors from troubled Belarus.
The Belarusian militia detained at least 1,048 people during last Sunday’s demonstrations, the Viasna human rights center said.
It was the highest number of protesters detained by the militia following the brutal crackdown by security forces against protesters immediately after the elections, when nearly 7,000 people were detained in a matter of days and torture of detainees was reported in detention centers. detention.
[ad_2]
