Belarusians began voting on Sunday, with President Alexander Lukashenko expected to cruise to victory unchallenged for a seventh term, prolonging his three-decade authoritarian rule.
Lukashenko – a 70-year-old former collective farm boss – has been in power in reclusive, Moscow-allied Belarus since 1994.
Polls opened at 08.00am in Minsk’s first presidential vote since Lukashenko suppressed mass protests against his rule in 2020. He has since allowed Moscow to use Belarusian territory to invade Ukraine in 2022.
The opposition and the West said Lukashenko rigged the last vote and the authorities cracked down on demonstrations, with more than a thousand people still jailed.
All of Lukashenko’s political opponents are either in prison – some held incommunicado – or in exile along with tens of thousands of Belarusians who have fled since 2020.
“All our opponents and enemies should understand: do not hope, we will never repeat what we had in 2020,” Lukashenko told a stadium in Minsk during a carefully choreographed ceremony on Friday.