*"Belarus Election: Snatched From The Streets In Europe's 'Last Dictatorship,'' Terror, Unfreedom
BBC News, July 21, 2020.
"Belarus election: Snatched from the streets in Europe's 'last dictatorship'"
Activists and journalists are being rounded up and jailed in Belarus ahead of next month’s elections.
People say it’s the most brutal crackdown the country has ever known.
President Alexander Lukashenko has been in power for more than a quarter of a century, but opposition to the authoritarian leader is growing.
Our Europe correspondent Jean Mackenzie has been given rare access to the country often described as Europe’s "last dictatorship".
Produced by Sara Monetta, filmed and edited by Andy Smythe. ~ End.
*WATCH THE VIDEO*
https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-europe-53491514/belarus-election-snatched-from-the-streets-in-europe-s-last-dictatorship
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- US State Department expresses concern at crackdowns under 'Europe's last dictator,' CNN, July 16, 2020
https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/16/politics/belarus-crackdowns-state-department/index.html
https://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/the-staggers/2012/03/belarus-assange-lukashenko
- (7 mins). 'Uprising In Europe's Last Dictatorship,' (2012).
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Wiki. Belarus, officially the Republic of Belarus formerly known by its Russian name Byelorussia or Belorussia, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Russia to the northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Its capital and most populous city is Minsk. Over 40% of its 207,600 square kilometres (80,200 sq mi) is forested. Its major economic sectors are service industries and manufacturing. Until the 20th century, different states at various times controlled the lands of modern-day Belarus..
In the aftermath of the 1917 Russian Revolution, different states arose competing for legitimacy amidst the Civil War, ultimately ending in the rise of the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic (Byelorussian SSR) which became a founding constituent republic of the Soviet Union in 1922. Belarus lost almost half of its territory to Poland after the Polish–Soviet War (1919–1921). Much of the borders of Belarus took their modern shape in 1939..
During WWII, military operations devastated Belarus, which lost about a quarter of its population and half of its economic resources. The republic was redeveloped in the post-war years. In 1945 the Byelorussian SSR became a founding member of the United Nations, along with the Soviet Union and the Ukrainian SSR. The parliament of the republic proclaimed the sovereignty of Belarus on 27 July 1990, and during the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Belarus declared independence on 25 August 1991. In 2000, Belarus and Russia signed a treaty for greater cooperation, forming the Union State.
> Alexander Lukashenko has served as the country's first president since 1994. Belarus has been labeled "Europe's last dictatorship" by some Western journalists, on account of the country's poor human rights record and Lukashenko's self-described authoritarian style of government. Lukashenko continued a number of Soviet-era policies, such as state ownership of large sections of the economy. Elections under Lukashenko's rule have been widely criticized as unfair; and according to many countries and organizations, political opposition has been violently suppressed. Belarus is also the only country in Europe officially using the death penalty.
> Belarus's Democracy Index rating is the lowest in Europe, the country is labelled as "not free" by Freedom House, as "repressed" in the Index of Economic Freedom, and is rated as the worst country for press freedom in Europe in the 2013–14 Press Freedom Index published by Reporters Without Borders, which ranks Belarus 157th out of 180 nations...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belarus
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