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Belarusian opponent Andrei Sanikov, who is visiting Vilnius, fears that Belarus could lose its sovereignty due to increasing Russian interference in the affairs of the crisis-hit country.
A politician who competed with Alexander Lukashenko in the Belarusian presidential elections a decade ago urges the West to send a “strong message” to Russia and threaten sanctions.
“Yes, she really is (in danger – BNS), because you know the nature of the Kremlin regime, you know that the intervention has already started by sending” propaganda soldiers “to work for Lukashenko on Belarusian state television. So the message was , and I emphasized to Minister Linkevičius that the world should send a strong message to Russia: remove your hands from Belarus or it will receive severe penalties for its behavior in Belarus, “Sanikov said at a press conference in Vilnius on Friday.
He also highlighted that the sanctions imposed by the European Union in 2010 not only on representatives of the government and power structures, but also on some businessmen, were very effective, as they provided an incentive to release members of the opposition, including himself. , from prison. He left Belarus in 2012.
Sanikov hopes the EU will follow a similar path this time and called for a “strict demand” for the release of political prisoners.
Therefore, I believe that in addition to personal and targeted sanctions, it is necessary to introduce economic sanctions against those who support the regime and against those who support the regime. It is not the economy, it is money that feeds the prisoners in Belarus, the prisoners who kill and paralyze people. It will be the most effective, “he emphasized.
The opposition also says it eagerly awaits the meeting of Russian and Belarusian Presidents Vladimir Putin and Alexander Lukashenko in Moscow next week, where joint decisions on the Union Treaty are expected.
“It doesn’t matter because it’s not legitimate to sign something. Yes, there is danger. But I think the world will see that this is another scenario of territorial annexation that has nothing to do with legitimate international agreements, ”he emphasized.
The former presidential candidate told the press that he had plans to return to his country and stand in the elections “when they are free.”
“I have plans to return to Belarus as soon as I am free and to participate in all the political campaigns that will take place. Because the skeleton of our team, which ran successfully in the 2010 elections, has survived. And we are working with Belarus, we live in different countries, most of us live in Belarus, but we are working only to make our country free, ”he said.
Sanikov also said that he did not want to answer the question of whether he trusted Pavel Latuška, a member of the Presidium of the Belarus Coordinating Council and former director of the Janka Kupala National Academic Theater, who was also visiting Vilnius on Friday.
“It is perfectly understandable that we are people of completely different categories: he is a man of the system, I am, as they now say, a representative of the old opposition.
A. Sanikov participated in the presidential elections in December 2010. He was subsequently arrested and sentenced to five years in prison for organizing mass riots and was released in April 2012. A few months later, he left the country.
Sanikov, who currently lives in Warsaw, says he has left the country “to work” and has not yet thought about returning to Belarus, saying it would be a “one-way ticket.”
“I was imprisoned and only after 16 months of pressure from the international community was I released,” he said.
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