Jade McGlynn

How Britain can really help Belarus’s embattled opposition

(Getty images)

Belarus’s opposition movement is gathering momentum. This week – just days after meeting president Biden – the country’s opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya was in London to visit Boris Johnson and Dominic Raab. But what does this mean for ordinary Belarusians living under the rule of Alyaksandr Lukashenka, the brutal dictator still in charge of the country? Do they finally have cause to be optimistic about the future?

As recently as April, Belarus’ democratic movement appeared to be running out of funding and impetus, with no clear strategy for ousting Lukashenka. Bolstered by a fearsome state security apparatus and Russian support, Lukashenka has unleashed a brutal crackdown on anyone who dares to challenge his 27-year reign.

Since last August’s falsified presidential elections sparked mass protests, the Belarusian KGB have arrested some 35,000 people. State television regularly broadcasts images of regime critics next to nooses. The apparent murder by hanging of Belarusian dissident Vital Shyshou in Kyiv earlier this week suggests these nooses are more than a rhetorical indulgence.

The horrors of Lukashenka’s repressive regime have been reverberating beyond Belarus’s borders for some time

The consequences – and horrors – of Lukashenka’s repressive regime have been reverberating beyond Belarus’s borders for some time. In May, the Belarusian state forced down a passenger jet in order to seize a dissident journalist flying between two EU states. For months, the Belarusian authorities have been conveying Iraqi migrants to the border with Lithuania, seemingly intent on inflaming internal EU tensions around migration.

Ironically, the opposition probably owes its recent change in prominence to these same deranged antics, which have shown that Lukashenka’s regime is a security problem for everyone – including the UK. During his meeting with Tsikhanouskaya, Boris Johnson assured the exiled Belarusian opposition leader of the UK’s support in characteristically robust terms. ‘We are very much on your side,’ the PM told Tsikhanouskaya. Yet

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