An opponent of Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko on Thursday called his supporters onto the streets ahead of an election he said would be rigged, but acknowledged the opposition was bound "hand and foot". Vladimir Neklyayev, head of the 'Tell the Truth' movement, said in an interview with Reuters that a sudden reconciliation between Lukashenko and Moscow had in particular wrong-footed the opposition.
Neklyayev, a 64-year-old poet whom opinion polls say lies in second position for Sunday's election, spoke as about 1,000 people rallied in the snow-bound capital Minsk protesting against the sure-fire re-election of Lukashenko who has ruled the ex-Soviet country since 1994. Protesters, gathered on Freedom Square at nightfall, held portraits of critics of Lukashenko's rule who they say have disappeared over the years.
There was an absence of police, however, and there was no move by the authorities to disperse the demonstrators. Lukashenko, a 56-year-old former state farm director, has defied the United States and the European Union for years by staying in power from one election to another and dealing ruthlessly with political dissenters.
On past performance, Lukashenko could win re-election on Sunday by as much as 80 percent of the vote. In the run-up to this election, however, he unusually became the target of a violent campaign on Russian television in which he was portrayed as being corrupt and dealing brutally with opponents.
But all that changed suddenly last week when Russia agreed to drop duties on oil exports to his country and keep natural gas prices unchanged next year. Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on Thursday firmed up the reconciliation saying: "The Belarussian leadership has taken a firm course to integration in the economic sphere with Russia. It goes without saying this choice deserves support and respect."Neklyayev, in the interview at his movement's headquarters, said many opposition parties had been hoping the campaign would be a prelude to Russia not recognising Lukashenko's re-election and subsequently bringing sanctions to bear on him.
"If there had been a hope of such a decision by Russia ... then today all that has evaporated," he said. And he expressed fears that the EU, which has condemned past elections as neither free nor fair, might also this time take a slightly softer line.
"If Russia recognises the election and the EU says there were a few definite positive changes, we will find ourselves in the situation when all questions linked to Belarus will be decided without the participation of the opposition," he said.
"He (Lukashenko) has bound us hand and foot. We have returned to the situation where we were in the 2006 elections," said Neklyayev. Lukashenko, whom the Bush administration once dubbed Europe's last dictator, has proved a master over the years at playing off one side against another to entrench his position. Russia's retreat from a full-scale break with Lukashenko reflects the Kremlin's fear of alienating an important ally that has served since the Soviet collapse as a buffer against Nato and European Union.
The EU, for its part, has now moved away from a strategy that risks pushing Belarus, which has borders with three EU states, into Moscow's arms. It has relaxed travel sanctions against Lukashenko, citing signs of liberalisation at home. Neklyayev scorned this strategy.
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