The elections are just a farce, she declared at the press conference.
The lack of recognition of Sunday’s presidential elections in Belarus is proof of the failure of attempts to legitimize the current regime, declared Belarusian opposition leader in exile Sviatlana Cichanovská. TASR informs about it according to the report of the PAP agency.
During a briefing in Warsaw, the politician described the presidential elections in the country as a “farce” or a “special election operation”, PAP reports. According to her, their goal is only to maintain power in the hands of the current president Alexander Lukashenko. If he wins, the president will get his seventh term and will be in office for more than 30 years.
The European Union and other countries refused to recognize the results of the Belarusian elections even before the results were published. According to Cichanovská, the opposition welcomed it, and at the same time it proves that attempts to legitimize the current regime have failed. She also underlined that Belarus will never accept Lukashenko, “a criminal who, with the help of (Russian President Vladimir) Putin, is holding 9 million Belarusians hostage,” PAP writes.
Cichanovská claims that the Belarusian opposition demands free and fair elections, the release of political prisoners and an end to repression. All those responsible for crimes must also bear the consequences, she declared.
Former Belarusian Minister of Culture and current opposition activist Pavel Latuška called on democratic countries not to recognize Lukashenko as president. According to PAP, he emphasized that the president deported 500,000 Belarusians from the country and eliminated all opposition parties, all independent media and more than 1,800 non-governmental organizations.
On Sunday, according to AP, only symbolic challengers who do not openly criticize the Belarusian leader will stand against Lukashenka in the elections. Most of the relevant opposition politicians are behind bars, in exile or have had their candidacy rejected by the electoral commission. Lukashenko became president for the first time in 1994.
