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Home > News from around the world > Russian Socialist Movement on Belarus

Belarus elections

Russian Socialist Movement on Belarus

Wednesday 12 August 2020, by Russian Socialist Movement (RSD)

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For three days since the presidential elections in Belarus, the streets of all major cities of the country have become the arena of heavy clashes between protesters and police. Despite the fact that by all independent exit polls and evidence of observers, the opposition candidate Svetlana Tikhanovskaya gained a convincing victory, authoritarian leader Alexander Lukashenko announced his re-election. Faced with the opposition of the majority of the population, today he has to rely only on the police and secret services, who have been given carte blanche for the most brutal suppression of protests. Thousands of detainees, hundreds of injured and at least one killed - that’s the price Lukashenko has already paid to preserve his regime. However, the resistance continues - not only in the form of street protests, but also in the political strikes that have already started at several big enterprises. We express our solidarity with workers and youth of Belarus in their struggle for a better future. We also demand for release of Belarussian left activists, such as Pavel Katarzhevski and Yury Glushakov, who were illegally arrested during these days. Below we publish the statement of the Russian Socialist Movement about the presidential elections in Belarus.

For free elections and against repression in Belarus

August 9, presidential elections will be held in Belarus. Throughout the country, on various floors of society, we see the mobilization of dissatisfied with Lukashenko’s regime, less and less popular and less socially-oriented, contrary to stereotypes and declarations. The authorities respond with threats and clumsy propaganda, provoking tension and discord instead of providing an opportunity for free elections. At the same time, the Kremlin carries out business plans to subordinate Belarus, which can cause nothing but indignation among Russian communists and socialists.

We are fighting for a democratic Russia that is able to build relations with Belarus and other neighbours on equal terms, with whom we are united by many historical, economic, cultural and family ties. We support the Belarusian people in their right for free elections, for independence from Russia and any other imperialist players. We support independent Belarusan trade unions, social movements, and left-wing organizations that oppose the usurper regime and criticize openly right, neoliberal alternatives to the existing system. We hope that the political uprising in Belarus will strengthen the influence of those forces which are ready to defend the interests of the majority of Belarusians - workers, students, pensioners, the interests of Belarus as an independent, democratic, social, and in the future socialist state.

Hands off from free elections! No to repressions!

Russian Socialist Movement

4 August 2020

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  • Russian Socialist Movement (RSD)

    The Russian Socialist movement was founded in March 2011 by two organizations, the Socialist Movement Vperiod (“Forward”), Russian section of the Fourth International, and Socialist Resistance. It is part of the Left Front, an alliance formed during the protests against the falsification of the elections in 2011 and 2012.

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