Tens of thousands protest in Belarus as Vladimir Putin phones Alexander Lukashenko to plan meeting
- The latest mass protest in Minsk saw dozens arrested as they called for fresh elections and an end to Lukashenko’s rule
- Russian president Putin spoke to Lukashenko on Sunday to wish him a happy birthday and discuss plans for military support
Belarus protests have entered a third week since the disputed presidential election on August 9 in which Lukashenko claimed victory.
Opposition rival Svetlana Tikhanovskaya says she was the true winner, meanwhile.
An AFP journalist and local media estimated that more than 100,000 people attended Sunday’s protest, equalling the scale of rallies on previous weekends, the largest in the country since independence from the former USSR.
A crowd gathered outside Lukashenko’s official residence, the Palace of Independence, which was guarded by riot police and special forces personnel backed up by rooftop snipers.
Sunday’s rally came on Lukashenko’s 66th birthday and protesters carried quirky handmade “gifts” including a cardboard toilet with a sign urging the strongman to flush himself away, a coffin marked “Political corpse” and a picture of a cockroach, the opposition’s nickname for the president.
