Belarus Protests Continue as New Interior Minister Takes Over

(Bloomberg) -- Thousands of Belarusians gathered in several locations in Minsk, trying to reach the city’s outskirts at a site where the victims of Josef Stalin’s purges were executed in the 1930s as tensions continued during the first weekend protests after President Alexander Lukashenko appointed a new interior minister.

Police sought to prevent protesters from gathering into a large group and made multiple arrests, according to reports in local media including the country’s largest news websites Tut.by and Onliner.by. More than 70 people including three journalists have been detained during the protest action on Sunday, according to Minsk-based human rights center Viasna which is not officially registered by the country’s authorities.

Sunday marks All Saints’ Day in Belarus, when people traditionally commemorate Stalin’s victims, lending a somber tone to the weekend’s protests.

The weekly rally came after growing student activism led to more than 120 expulsions from Minsk universities, according to the non-governmental Belarusian Student Association, and as Lukashenko warned people not to cross “red lines” in their protests.

“If anyone touches a soldier, I have already instructed the generals, he should leave without hands at a very minimum,” Lukashenko said when introducing Interior Minister Ivan Kubrakov Friday.

The government has been resorting to tougher measures to end 12 weeks of protests over the disputed Aug. 9 elections that Lukashenko claims he won in a landslide. At last week’s protests, the authorities used stun grenades and detained hundreds, while on Thursday Lukashenko shut the borders with most of the country’s neighbors. Warning shots and stun grenades were used today as well to scare off protesters, according to media reports.

Belarus temporarily limited entry through ground checkpoints from Lithuania, Latvia, Poland and Ukraine on Thursday, citing the Covid-19 pandemic. Cargo shipments are still allowed to cross, and the border with Russia and the country’s international airport remain open. Local officials have previously claimed that Belarus’s neighbors are trying to destabilize the political situation.

The political crisis is the worst of Lukashenko’s 26 years in power and has forced him closer to his ally Russia, which has provided financial support during the protests. Neither the U.S. nor the European Union have accepted the outcome of the election.

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