Belarus’ Lukashenko defiant as protests, strikes continue

Bloomberg

Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko moved to crack down on opponents after more demonstrations against his
26-year rule brought tens of thousands of people to the streets of the capital and other cities over the weekend demanding his resignation.
Police detained at least four anti-government activists, including organisers of strikes at some of the country’s largest factories and a politician on the opposition’s coordinating council.
The moves came a day after more than 100,000 protesters gathered in and around Independence Square in Minsk, despite phalanxes of riot police and barbed-wire barricades spread across the city. Lukashenko was shown later on state television flying into his Minsk residence in a helicopter carrying an automatic rifle and clad in a bullet-proof vest.
The former Soviet collective farm boss is confronting the biggest challenge to his rule after claiming a landslide in the August 9 election, which triggered protests and international condemnation of the vote. Opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, who fled to Lithuania after the results, has been calling on followers to take to the streets, while urging foreign powers not to intervene.
Opposition leaders vowed to continue the fight despite Lukashenko’s hard line.
“Turning back the situation is not possible anymore,” said coordinating council member Maria Kalesnikava. “We are united, consolidated, peaceful and demand respect and that our voice, the voice of majority, be heard.”
Activists in the country’s independent unions have called on workers to go on strike to build pressure on the regime, while Lukashenko vowed to shut any factories where there were stoppages. Leaders of the strike movement at Belaruskali, a major potash fertiliser producer, and two large Minsk-based industrial plants were detained, one of whom is on the coordinating council, that Tikhanovskaya has formed for dialog with the regime. Another member of the council was also pulled in by the police.
“We think these actions by the authorities are completely illegal,” said coordinating council member Lilia Vlasova.
Efforts to broaden the strikes appeared to be struggling under pressure from management and the security services. “It’s Brownian motion to which we are trying to bring some order,” said Siarhei Antusevich, Deputy Chairman of Belarusian Congress of Democratic Trade Unions, which is trying to organise strike committees into a single national entity.
After an extremely brutal crackdown on protesters in the first days following the vote failed to scotch the opposition movement, Lukashenko has stuck mainly to shows of force, with riot police not confronting protesters and military drills on his western border, and public derision for his critics.
Lukashenko “is sure that he can rewind to the beginning, let the protests blow off steam, punish some and intimidate others and return his old control over the country,”
political analyst Artem Shraibman wrote on the Tut.by news website.