Aleksander Lukashenka came into power by winning presidential election 17 years ago – on July 10th, 1994. Promising to fight corruption, he managed to win support of majority of the Belarusian society. However, as soon as he took the post, he focused on restoring a Soviet model in Belarus. National symbols were replaced with the soviet ones, and Russian became an official state language.
Over last 17 years, Belarus had diplomatic conflicts almost with all her neighbors. Additional troubles came with the economic crisis. Lukashenka has been promising average salary raise, but so far Belarusians have the lowest in Europe wages, except from Moldova.
Currently, there are more than 30 political prisoners in Belarus. Three of them are former presidential candidate – Andrei Sannikov, Mikolai Statkievich and Zmitser Vus. Many dissidents are subjected to a constant control of the government, and some of them had to flee the country.
Belsat
