2 protesters killed, 6,000 arrested in Belarus

A SECOND protester has died in violent demonstrations that were sparked by Sunday’s disputed election result in Belarus, the country’s Investigative Committee said in a statement. The 25-year-old man died after he was detained on Sunday for taking part in illegal protests in the southeastern city of Gomel and sentenced to 10 days in prison.

Riot police have detained thousands at street protests across the country after long-serving leader Alexander Lukashenko claimed a landslide victory. The strongman’s opponents accuse him of rigging the election against his main rival, massively popular opposition candidate Svetlana Tikhanovskaya. In three previous nights of protests, at least 6,000 people have been detained and hundreds injured, according to the official count, but even that high toll appeared to downplay the scope. Anguished relatives were besieging prisons across Belarus trying to find their missing relatives.

Previously police said one protester died when an explosive device went off in his hand on Monday. The latest death came as opposition protesters took to the streets to condemn police violence. In the capital Minsk, several hundred women joined hands to form a human chain, many wearing white and holding flowers.

The 65-year-old Lukashenko has led the former Soviet state of 9.5 million people since 1994, relentlessly stifling dissent and winning the nickname “Europe’s last dictator” in the West. This year, the economic damage caused by the coronavirus and the president’s swaggering response to the pandemic, which he airily dismissed as “psychosis,” has fueled broad anger, helping swell the opposition ranks – but Lukashenko has dismissed them.