According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Warsaw, independent candidates could not participate in the elections and political opponents were subjected to repression and intimidation. The Belarusian population was also deprived of independent information due to “extensive censorship and state propaganda“. TASR informs based on the reports of the PAP, AFP and TASS agencies.
According to the Polish Department of Diplomacy, Belarusian citizens were denied the right to choose their leader, and therefore the ministry cannot recognize the results of these elections, which, according to him, were held “in violation of basic democratic procedures.”
Belarusian opposition leader in exile Sviatlana Cichanovská declared that the Belarusian people and the international community will not accept the result of these elections. The European Parliament has called on the European Union to reject the election results, EuroNews reports. Head of EU diplomacy, Kaja Kallasová, on the X network, described the elections as “an obvious insult to democracy”.
On Monday, Russian President Vladimir Putin congratulated Lukashenko, who, according to preliminary results, won 86.82 percent of the vote in Sunday’s presidential election. According to Putin, the elections in Belarus showed that Lukashenko has the “unquestionable” support of the people.
According to the preliminary results announced on Monday by the Chairman of the Central Election Commission of Belarus, Igor Karpenko, Lukashenko won more than five million votes. Voter turnout reached 85.69 percent. According to the Interefax agency, the final press conference on the election results will take place on February 3.
The Belarusian president and close ally of Putin has been at the head of the country since 1994, i.e. six five-year terms. “Your convincing victory in the elections clearly testifies to your high political authority and the undoubted support of the population for the state policy of Belarus,” Putin said, according to a statement on the Kremlin’s website. “You are always welcome on Russian soil. Based on our agreement, I expect to see you soon in Moscow,” he added.
Chinese President Xi Jinping also congratulated Lukashenko on Monday. On Sunday, according to the AP agency, only symbolic challengers opposed Lukashenko, who do not openly criticize the Belarusian leader. The most successful of them, the candidate of the Communist Party of Belarus, Siarhei Syrankov, won more than three percent.
After the last presidential election in 2020, the electoral commission awarded Lukashenko 80.1 percent of the vote. It sparked nationwide pro-democracy protests, which were violently suppressed by the government with the help of Russia. The UN estimates that an estimated 300,000 people have left Belarus since then. Human rights groups register more than 1,200 political prisoners in the country.
