Belarus leader tells opposition leaders: ‘Repent and kneel’

Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko delivers his speech throughout a state-of-the-nation handle in Minsk, Belarus, Friday, Jan. 28, 2022.

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KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Belarus’ authoritarian chief on Friday suggested exiled opposition activists to “come residence, repent and kneel,” whereas repeating a obscure promise to step down if the individuals “make the choice” for him.

President Alexander Lukashenko made the remarks in his yearly state of the nation handle, searching for to underscore his grip on energy after suppressing an unprecedented wave of mass protests in opposition to his rule.

In 2020 Lukashenko, who has run Belarus with an iron fist for nearly three many years, survived the most important and probably the most sustained wave of mass protests within the nation’s historical past. Demonstrations, the most important of which drew as much as 200,000 individuals, have been triggered by him profitable a sixth time period in workplace in a presidential election in August 2020 that the opposition and the West denounced as rigged.

Protesters demanded a brand new election and Lukashenko’s ouster and confronted a brutal crackdown from the authorities, with greater than 35,000 arrested and 1000's brutally overwhelmed. Key opposition figures, together with Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, Lukashenko’s primary contender within the election, have left the nation amid the clampdown, together with 1000's of strange Belarusians.

Lukashenko on Friday claimed that not more than 10% of the inhabitants opposes his rule, and urged opposition activists in exile to return “residence, in your knees, groveling.”

“My recommendation to you: come residence, repent and kneel,” Lukashenko stated. “It'll worsen additional on.”

After suppressing the protests, Lukashenko repeatedly aired obscure and non-committal guarantees to step down. On Friday, he burdened that it was as much as the individuals to determine. “You'll determine, and this president will retire. In case you take into account obligatory that I do extra for this nation, you'll say so,” Lukashenko stated.

Final week, Lukashenko referred to as a referendum for late February, on constitutional amendments that would permit him to additional cement his grip on energy and stay in workplace till 2035. The vote is scheduled to be held on Feb. 27.

The amendments convey again limits on presidential phrases that had been abolished throughout Lukashenko’s tenure, permitting a president solely two five-year phrases in workplace. Nevertheless, the restriction will solely take impact as soon as a “newly elected president” assumes workplace, which supplies Lukashenko a possibility to run for 2 extra phrases after his present one expires in 2025.

The amendments additionally confer substantial new powers on the All-Belarus Folks’s Meeting, a physique that nominally represents a wide selection of Belarusian society however that previously has consisted largely of presidency officers and supporters. The president routinely turns into a member of the meeting and may be elected by the opposite delegates as its chairman.