Thousands of Belarusians boycott the start of the school year to demand Lukashenko's departure

Student demonstration in Minsk, September 1, 2020. Tut.By via REUTERS

Text by: RFI Follow

3 min

More than 3 weeks of mobilizations in Belarus and a very disturbed school and university start on Tuesday.

Thousands of them boycotted it to demand the departure of President Alexander Lukashenko.

Publicity

Read more

Outside the riot police surrounding one of the university buildings;

inside angry students and an algarade with a member of the management.

" 

 " said a gray-haired university leader.

" 

 ," replied this student.

On other images of Belta, one of the few independent media still able to exercise, we see men in civilian clothes, jeans and black jackets, their faces masked, everywhere threatening students, pushing those who in the outer aisles are trying to sign a petition, demand new elections;

load them into trucks.

In the street tens of thousands of young people try to demonstrate.

Some still try to keep the energy and the joy of their beginnings.

Still on the rare independent images circulating on social networks, Tuesday afternoon at a good distance from men in black, we saw in the streets of Minsk young people in colorful clothes dancing in the street, like a snub to repression .

A fractured opposition?

Signs of a fracture appeared for the first time within the opposition.

The opponent in exile

, candidate against Alexander Lukashenko in the presidential election of August 9, publicly criticized in a statement the strategy of another opposition group with which she had formed an alliance before the election.

She said in particular that the Opposition Coordination Council " 

 ", after the announcement of the creation of a new party called Ensemble by another opponent, Maria Kolesnikova, and the team. of the imprisoned candidate Viktor Babariko.

Svetlana Tikhanovskaïa also attacked the project of constitutional reform defended by this new party, believing that it diverted from the main objective, which is the dismissal of Alexander Lukashenko and the holding of new elections.

Newsletter

Receive all the international news directly in your mailbox

I subscribe

Follow all the international news by downloading the RFI application

google-play-badge_FR

• Belarus

On the same subject

Belarus: the regime increases the pressure on its opponents by making them dismiss

Belarusian President Lukashenko declared persona non grata by Baltic states

Belarus: tens of thousands of demonstrators still march against Lukashenko