Demonstrations against President Lukashenko’s dictatorship and election fraud continue in Belarus. On Saturday, the country’s security forces arrested at least 390 demonstrators in the capital Minsk for participating in the Women’s March for Lukashenka’s ouster. One of them, a 73-year-old famous grandmother demonstrator, was also arrested by authorities wearing a black hood to conceal her identity.
Thousands of people, mostly women, took to the streets in Minsk that day. They carried unofficial red and white Belarusian banners calling for Lukashenko’s ouster. Police and other security forces loyal to Lukashenko continued to arrest demonstrators, and videos of demonstrations posted on the Internet showed police officers wearing black hoods surrounding some of the women participating in the march, while the female demonstrators built a wall to confront the police.
Among the hundreds of arrests was Nina Bahinskaya, 73, who has been an active participant in the demonstrations for the past six weeks. She is well known to the Belarusian public for her active participation in protests at an older age. She was reportedly later released. In addition, Belarusian opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, who is currently in exile in Lithuania, is expected to be invited to a meeting of EU foreign ministers on Monday. Lukashenko’s authorities have called this interference in internal affairs and have protested to the EU.
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