Collective Security Treaty Organisation members should contribute to its further development since it is ‘very important’, Alyaksandr Lukashenka said at Thursday’s meeting with CSTO Director General Stanislau Zas.
Proving the significance of the alliance, Lukashenka referred to the recent events in Belarus and the reaction to them in Russia and other countries.
It is the ‘influence from outside’ that triggered the current political events in Belarus, Lukashenka believes. According to him, ‘Western partners’ have become too active and have gone too far in what concerns Belarus.
“The internal situation is not just complicated, the main reason for it is an external one. If not for the external pressure and influence, it would have never happened in Belarus. We have been through all kinds of things. But then the influence from outside was minimal, and now they have activated to the full. We will deal with it,” state-run news agency BelTA quotes Lukashenka.
In turn, Stanislau Zas admitted that the organisation was facing a number of issuess, including the coronavirus pandemic, the protests in Belarus and Kyrgyzstan, the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh.
On August 9, the presidential vote was held in Belarus; its official results were not recognised by the EU and the United States. The Kremlin, in turn, acknowledged the legitimacy of Alyaksandr Lukashenka’s sixth presidency. Moscow sees no sense in establishing contacts with representatives of the opposition Coordination Council set up by his strongest opponent Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya and her associates, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told his Belarusian counterpart Uladzimir Makey.
According to the Belarusian Central Election Commission, 80.1% of voters supported Lukashenka in the 2020 presidential election. Belarusian officials state that Tsikhanouskaya got 10.12% of votes. However, on the back of announcing the results of the official exit polls, Belarusians started to take to the streets, claiming that their votes were stolen. The protests have been underway for over two months.
On October, Tsikhanouskaya’s team demanded Lukashenka’s resignation, warning that the protesters would issue People’s Ultimatum to the regime if he refused.
