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The opposition in exile has called for a boycott of the parliamentary vote, which involves parties supporting Alexander G. Lukashenko, who has ruled the country for 30 years.
By Andrew Higgins
Amid a series of high-stakes elections set to take place around the world this year, the Eastern European country of Belarus on Sunday presented an option to the unpredictability of democracy: a vote in parliament on a single candidate who criticizes the country’s despotic leader.
All opposition parties were banned (association in a single party is a crime) and the four approved parties that participated in the elections competed only to outdo others in their displays of unwavering loyalty to the country’s leader, President Alexander G. Lukashenko, who ruled Belarus with an iron fist for 30 years.
For the government, Sunday’s election — the first since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Belarus’ southern neighbor — is an opportunity to show Moscow, its ally, that it has quelled domestic opposition and survived the economy. other tensions imposed through the war. Russia, which in the past had doubted Lukashenko’s longevity and reliability, launched its invasion in February 2022 in part from Belarusian territory.
Sviatlana Tikhanovskaya, an exiled opponent of Lukashenko, said: “These so-called elections are still a circus show. It’s even entertaining.
The Belarusian elections are in format and predictability with respect to next month’s elections in Russia to nominate Mr. Putin for a fifth term in the Kremlin.
The European Union, which has been waiting for years for Belarus, sandwiched between Russia and Poland, to be removed from the Kremlin’s orbit, called the entire procedure a farce. The bloc’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, last week denounced the “continued and senseless violation of human rights and the point of unprecedented repression by Mr. Lukashenko in the run-up to the upcoming elections. “The culprits will be held accountable. “
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