protest
From exile, Tichanovskaya calls for resistance in Belarus
“We have a long way to go. But every small step brings our victory closer,” says opposition leader Svetlana Tichanovskaya. photo
© Kay Nietfeld/dpa/Archive
Three years ago, long-term ruler Lukashenko had himself declared the winner after the election results had been falsified – which caused a large wave of protests. The opposition leader is not giving up hope.
Three years after the rigged presidential elections in Belarus, opposition leader Svetlana Tichanovskaya called for resistance against ruler Alexander Lukashenko.
“We have a long way to go. But every small step brings our victory closer,” said the 40-year-old in a video message from exile. “Belarus will be a free, independent, democratic country, a proud member of the family of European nations.”
In the August 2020 election, long-term ruler Lukashenko once again declared himself the winner after the election results had been falsified. At the time, Tichanovskaya ran for office in place of her imprisoned husband, Sergei. In polling stations where the count could be observed more or less freely, she was ahead of Lukashenko. Because of this election, the ex-Soviet republic experienced the largest wave of protests in its history in 2020; Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets. Lukashenko brutally suppressed the protest with police violence.
Tichanovskaya recalled the fate of “several thousand political prisoners”. There has been no sign of life from her imprisoned comrade-in-arms Maria Kolesnikova for six months. Moscow supported Lukashenko at the time. He then made his country available as a deployment area for the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine. “The regime has made our country an accomplice in the Kremlin’s war crimes,” said Tichanovskaya.