Sawt Falasteen - Belarus opposition leader eyes 'opportunity' for change

Belarus will hold the ballot on January 26, four and a half years after the last presidential election, when suspicions of vote rigging led to nationwide mass protests that were brutally repressed.

The Russia ally has been ruled since 1994 by strongman President Alexander Lukashenko, who has eliminated all forms of opposition and jailed hundreds of critics and protesters.

Tikhanovskaya, a former English teacher, claimed victory against Lukashenko in the election but was forced to leave and now lives in Lithuania.

In an interview with AFP in Warsaw this week, she called the upcoming vote -- in which Lukashenko will run unchallenged -- a "sham" and a "farce".

Political opponents "are in prison or in exile. All the parties are liquidated. No free media... People are really frightened by four years of repression," Tikhanovskaya said.

"What Lukashenko is doing is reappointing himself by himself... This ritual will not change anything," she said.

But she added that it was not time to take to the streets again.

"It's not the moment," she said.

"I really don't want people to sacrifice their freedom at the moment for nothing, you know, in vain. I ask people to save themselves for a really proper moment," she added.

"It will come for sure, and people have to be ready."

Tikhanovskaya offered several scenarios for such a "window of opportunity", including a victory for neighbouring Ukraine, which has been battling a Russian invasion since 2022.

"It can be economic turbulence in Belarus. It can be like simply a coup d'etat in political structures, because many people around Lukashenko are not happy with him," she said.

"It might be health problems... My task is to be prepared for this moment, not to lose the opportunity."

This month will also see Donald Trump take office as US president.

Tikhanovskaya said her team already had some connections with the new administration, for whom they want to highlight the geopolitical importance of Belarus.

"Without a free and democratic and independent Belarus, there will be no security in Europe. There will be a constant threat," she said.

"There is uncertainty in the political world... but I can't actually draw in my imagination a scenario where the US will betray their democratic principles."

- 'Intensify' pressure on Minsk -

Tikhanovskaya in 2020 took over the presidential campaign of her husband Sergei Tikhanovsky, who had planned to challenge Lukashenko but was arrested and detained before the vote.

He was sentenced to 18 years in prison in 2021 for organising riots and inciting social hatred, according to state media.

Tikhanovskaya said she had not heard from her husband -- who is being held incommunicado like many other political prisoners -- since March 2023.

"Of course it's very difficult, you know. The regime wants to exhaust relatives, first of all, but also to once again punish (the prisoners)," she told AFP.

"It's so easy to persuade people behind bars that, 'Look, the world has forgotten about you. They don't care.'... This is like psychological torture," she added.

In the run-up to the election, Minsk has pardoned some political prisoners, while photos and videos of others have been published for the first time in months.

Tikhanovskaya said she was "so glad" to see the images and would love to see her husband "to make sure that he's alive".

But she did not know what to expect from the regime.

"Repressions are even intensifying before the so-called elections," she added.

Tikhanovskaya called on institutions like the United Nations, the Red Cross and the Vatican "to be proactive, demanding access to political prisoners" in Belarus.

"All these appearances of our heroes in prisons or this releasing of people is a result of attention, of political, economic pressure," Tikhanovskaya said.

"That's why we have to intensify this pressure."

N.AbuHussein--SF-PST