The old reflexes are back. President Alexander Lukashenko, in power since 1994 and who was running for a sixth term on Sunday, used the means he is accustomed to when the opposition awakens: intimidation and arrests. After a campaign in which the surprise candidate, Svetlana Tikhonovskaya, a 37-year-old ex-English teacher, took tens of thousands of people to the streets - unheard of for several years -, the head of the State has locked the ballot.
Read also: Belarus: Lukashenko challenged by the awakening of the opposition
Fearing for her safety, Ms Tikhonovskaïa, who took over the torch from her imprisoned husband last May, had to spend Saturday night in an undisclosed location. His campaign manager was arrested. Likewise, Maria Kolesnikova, one of the three women who took the lead in the opposition, was briefly detained by the Belarusian FSB.
The third member of the trio, Véronika Tsepkalo left Minsk, the Belarusian capital, to join her husband, a
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