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Putin, who met with Lukashenko in Sochi on Monday, is convinced that the opposition will not overthrow the president of Belarus, said five people in the Kremlin, who do not want to come forward when discussing domestic politics, Bloomberg reports.
This will be Putin and Lukashenko’s first face-to-face meeting since August 9. the people of Belarus, who won a presidential election that won an overwhelming advantage, rebelled and demanded Lukashenko’s resignation.
There are no signs that the protesters are starting to exhale, and the presumed Belarusian leader, who wants to extend his 26-year term, is not giving up on even blackening his nail.
“Belarus is very important,” said Mikhail Vinogradov, director of the St. Petersburg-based Political Foundation. “Putin does not want to be on the side of the losers.”
The crisis involving Moscow’s closest partner is reminiscent of previous uprisings that toppled Kremlin-backed leaders in Ukraine and Armenia. Furthermore, until very recently, Putin amended the Russian Constitution to extend his two-decade term even until 2036.
The Russian government was stunned by the scale of the unrest in Belarus, people around the Kremlin said. Although Moscow does not trust Lukashenko, it cannot allow the opposition to come to power through street protests, so it will support the President of Belarus for a long time and urge the eventual election of a successor, Bloomberg reports.
Mass protests resumed in Belarus on Sunday. In Minsk alone, more than 150,000 people participated in the protests. persons.
The Belarusian Interior Ministry has reported that more than 400 people have been detained, but the actual number could be higher.
Unauthorized actions were carried out on Sunday in other Belarusian cities, including Gomel and Brest, according to Belarusian opposition media.
Warning shots were fired at the Drozdy settlement in Minsk, where the Belarusian leadership lives, when opposition participants gathered.
As witnesses told Interfax, officials fired several shots after a crowd of thousands gathered at the firewall and the number of protesters began to grow rapidly.
What weapon was fired and whether any injuries were reported.
Previously, the protest columns on Winners Avenue near the Arena City Mall were blocked by OMON officials. They surrounded the first groups of protesters and began arresting people.
Law enforcement officers use special equipment against opposition supporters in Brest, Belarus.
As witnesses told Interfax, hundreds of people took to the streets in Brest on Sunday to show solidarity with the protesters in Minsk.
Police officers repeatedly warned the crowd that the action had not been coordinated with authorities and then used water cannons to eject people, witnesses said.
For more than a month there have been unprecedented protests in Belarus over the August 9 presidential election, which Lukashenko has ruled the country since 1994. The opposition and Western democracies consider these elections rigged.
“Put all the dots in the” i “
Lukashenko will pay a “working visit” to Russia on Monday to meet with President Putin, the Kremlin said on Friday.
According to the Kremlin report, the leaders of the two countries will meet at the Black Sea resort of Sochi to discuss plans for further integration and key trade and energy projects.
“It is planned to discuss the most important issues for the further development of the Russia-Belarus strategic partnership and the alliance,” he said.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that Putin and Lukashenko did not plan a press conference or sign any documents.
Lukashenko said last week that he planned to “put all the points on the most sensitive and sensitive issues for both parties” in talks with Putin.
Moscow has previously said it will respond to any Western attempt to “influence the situation” in Belarus, and Putin has hinted at the possibility of sending military support to the Minsk regime.
At the time, the United States announced on Friday that it would impose sanctions on Belarus in the coming days and warned Moscow to stop supporting the Minsk regime.
Under Secretary of State Stephen Biegun said the United States is coordinating plans with the European Union and seeking to apply sanctions to both individuals and export regulations.
He also asked how Russia “can support such a regime and such violence against peaceful citizens exercising their constitutionally protected rights to freedom of assembly, association and expression.”
“If the Kremlin continues down this path, it runs the risk that the people of Belarus, who do not blame Russia, will oppose Moscow,” Biegun said.
This will be Lukashenko’s first visit to Russia since a wave of protests in Belarus over his disputed re-election to a sixth term.
The authoritarian Belarusian leader has said he will not cede power to the opposition, which claims that his candidate Sviatlana Cichanouskaya is the rightful winner of the August 9 elections. After the elections, under pressure from S. Cichanouskaja, the authorities withdrew to Lithuania.
Lukashenko’s relations with Russia have been quite volatile so far, and he has repeatedly tried to topple Moscow with the European Union when it has been to his advantage. However, when mass protests began in the country, he sought the advice and help of Putin, with whom he speaks regularly on the phone.
Moscow is Lukashenko’s strongest ally and has offered him military assistance, while forcing Minsk to take steps to bring the two countries closer together.
Russia and Belarus have formed an allied state and maintain close economic and military ties. Russia is calling for stronger integration, but Lukashenko has repeatedly ruled out the possibility of uniting the two countries.
On Thursday, the Russian ambassador to Minsk, Dmitry Mezencev, presented Lukashenko, who recently celebrated his 66th birthday, with a symbolic gift: a set of historical maps depicting Belarus when it was part of the Russian Empire.
The Lukashenko regime responded to unprecedented protests with waves of arrests, brutal violence against protesters, and a campaign of intimidation and expulsion of opposition leaders.
The opposition has formed a Coordination Council to organize a peaceful transfer of power, but virtually all members of its presidency have been detained or expelled from Belarus.
Maryja Kalesnikava, one of the most active members of the opposition, currently held in a remand center in Minsk, issued a statement through her lawyers saying that she had received threats from security agents to remove her from the country, “alive or in parts “.
The opposition said it had broken her passport to prevent her from being deported to Ukrainian territory. She was later arrested and listed as a suspect in a case of calls for power.
On Friday, two Belarusian protesters applied for asylum at the Swedish embassy in Minsk, saying they needed protection from Belarusian law enforcement after a recent demonstration.
They “have declared that they want to apply for asylum in Sweden,” said a spokeswoman for the Swedish Foreign Ministry.
EU members Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania have imposed sanctions on Mr. Lukashenko and other senior officials for fraudulent elections and repression of protesters.
The authoritarian leader of the landlocked country has stated that it may stop shipping Belarusian cargo through the ports of the Baltic states and divert them through Russia. The transport ministries of both countries discussed the issue on Friday.
According to observers, Moscow will seek to exploit Lukashenko’s political vulnerability to reap concessions from him.
“Russia will seek to make the most of its support for Lukashenko,” Konstantin Kalachov, head of the Group of Political Experts in Moscow, told AFP.
“It completely depends on Russia,” he explained.
But Andrei Suzdaltsev of the Moscow School of Economics said it would be unwise for Russia to support Lukashenko when he lost legitimacy in the eyes of many Belarusians.
‘A. Lukashenko and integration are incompatible, “he told AFP. According to him, this leader promises” anything but nothing “, and such agreements can only enrage Belarusians.
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