Belarus: Lukashenko signs law giving him immunity from criminal prosecution

Belarus: Lukashenko signs law giving him immunity from criminal prosecution

Fellow rusian leader Alexander lukashenko has signed a new law giving him lifelong immunity from Criminal prosecution the measure also prevents opposition figures living abroad from running in future presidential elections only citizens of belus who have lived in the country for 20 years will be permitted to stand that rules out all

Opposition figures who fled the country following a Crackdown against protesters after the contested 2020 elections lukashenko has been in office for almost three decades let’s bring in Hannah lakova she’s a journalist from Belarus with good contexts to the bellarus opposition welcome to the day good to see you let’s

Start with the law giving lukashenko lifetime immunity what’s the motivation behind that in your opinion first of all lukashenka I think indicates well it indicates that Lenka recognizes the winning nature of his role let’s remember that he is the man who will turn 70 next year when he will

Most probably participate in the presidential election yet another one um and he’s also the man who doesn’t perhaps have a good health because he had a lot of stress stress in the past three years it also these new amendments also show that he’s trying to safeguard himself against potential legal legal

Consequences of uh his rule of everything that he did in the past three decades we remember that uh 3 years ago during protests in 2020 there was torture there were killings of people on the street so the human right Council also recognized some of the crimes as

Crimes against humanity so this is his attempt to stay safe and have this immunity so he’s under pressure you mentioned his age and his health there is there any evidence that either of those factors might lead him to step down anytime soon actually it’s a today he announced

That he will definitely run in the election in 2025 he said that well I um the president wants to continue to be president this is exactly what he said so um so this might mean the beginning of this campaign which will will happen in the next one year and a half and I

Don’t really think that such a dictator as lukashenka who has been in power for the past three decades would uh voluntarily uh give away power because we know uh that this is one of the things that he really enjoys to have let’s look at that election that is

Coming up because he also issued a ban on exiled belarusians or at least people who haven’t lived in belus continuously for the past 20 years what do you make of that move he is definitely well scared of potential Rivals politicians who might emerge uh especially when we uh when we

Are talking about the oppos opposition which is currently in Exile this is something that he’s trying to prevent he doesn’t want them to participate in uh election well next year or uh you know anytime soon um so so this is I guess the most reasonable explanation to this

He also limited the um age of uh of of people who can run who can be his Rivals this is again something that he introduced and let’s remember that in 1994 when he actually came to power the age actually decreased so who he could participate so now he changes this again

But again all these things can um can change really quickly because U if a democratic successor if somebody new would come to power this person new person can definitely bring these former rules back so the opposition outside the country do they have a strategy for challenging lukashenka’s regime in

Belarus well the main U important points I think the main strategy of the opposition is to have first pressure on the regime so U the elites would split so there will be some Dynamic inside the system we are talking about sanctions here we are talking about legal pressure

The Tribunal for example which some of the members of the opposition have been discussing in the past years and by the way this might be one of the reasons of this new immunity of this amendments that lukashenka introduced um and on the other hand of course it’s support for uh

Civil society and for all the institutions such as media Outlets who uh keep informing citizens about the situation inside the country and of course geopolitical situation too so these are two ways of how the opposition maintains um um I guess it significance right for for people people inside the

Country the most important one here is now how to split the elites because this is something that is really difficult to do for now lenk’s grip on power remains strong is there any chance of opposition emerging from within the system you mentioned the elites that the opposition

Is trying to split on him is that a realistic prospect that they could turn on him and a challenger could emerge from within I know throughout all the years of my reporting and and being an analyst I heard from people inside this system that not all of them are happy and we

Are talking about officials on different levels however they cannot do much uh be you know given the current level of repression and control that lukashenka is and his inner circle have on on the system so this is difficult uh We’ve also seen that there there are very many

People inside the system who try to re form it who try to reform the economy for example but in 2020 this has changed because Lenka noticed that all these liberals um can be also some sort of a um might challenge his regime so this is this is why lukashenka doesn’t allow at

This stage at this point people who might become um this challenge right people kind of liberal people inside the system however we know that not all of them are happy yeah uh Before I Let You Go I want to quickly talk about the role of Russia will Moscow under Putin at least ever

Allow belus to slip out of its orbit the way Ukraine did I would say that the costs of losing belus for Russia um perhaps even higher than losing Ukraine because we see that Belarus the regime of Belarus is now one of the very few allies that Putin has especially material allies the Allies

That uh provides the territory for the attack for The Invasion and this is how the role of Belarus also increased for Putin and the role of lukashenka who supports him in this Invasion so I think that Putin will do anything everything not to lose Belarus at this point and

It’s really important to recognize that uh belus cannot be left cannot be given away to Russia as a trophy because there is such a threat if uh Russia well loses the war um then of course Russia would like to have belus at least journalist hanakova thank you so much for your insights

Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko has signed a new law giving him lifelong immunity from criminal prosecution.

The measure also prevents opposition figures living abroad from running in future presidential elections. Only citizens of Belarus who have lived in the country for 20 years will be permitted to stand. That rules out all opposition figures who fled the country following a crackdown against protesters after the contested 2020 elections. Lukashenko has been in office for almost three decades.

Chapters:
0:00 Background on Belarus
0:31 Hanna Liubakova, Journalist

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