Belarus opposition leader warns of Russia’s threat: ‘We know dictatorship’

Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya says her country's struggle for democracy is also against Russia's ongoing subjugation of Belarus, which poses a danger to the Belarusian people.

The exiled leader of the opposition to Belarus’ authoritarian government says her country’s struggle for democracy is also one for its sovereignty as Russia continues to draw Belarus into its war on Ukraine.

Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who fled to Lithuania in 2020 after President Alexander Lukashenko deployed a severe crackdown on protests against his disputed election win, says Lukashenko’s confirmation last week that “several dozen” Russian nuclear weapons have been positioned inside Belarus is another example of Russia’s subjugation, which has affected “all spheres of Belarusian life.”

“For us, it’s a question of sovereignty of Belarus,” she told Mercedes Stephenson in an interview that aired Sunday on The West Block.

“If these brutal dictators (Lukashenko and Russian President Vladimir Putin) launch these nuclear weapons, the counterattack will be on Belarus. … This is a crime.”

Lukashenko and Putin have strengthened their alliance in the wake of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, helping each other evade economic sanctions imposed by NATO and other allies. Belarus has also hosted Russian troops and facilitated their entry into Ukrainian territory, although Belarus has not involved its own armed forces in the conflict.

Belarusian and Russian state media on Thursday quoted Lukashenko telling the Belarusian People’s Congress that internal and external threats from the Belarus opposition and NATO — which he presented without evidence — justified hosting Russian nuclear weapons as part of a new national security and military doctrine. Putin and Lukashenko first agreed on nuclear weapons placements in Belarus last year.

Tsikhanouskaya said the closer bond between Lukashenko and Putin paints a false portrait of Belarus as a Russian proxy or “appendix,” which she said the majority of Belarusian people do not support.

“We are a European nation who wants to return to its European roots, who want to be part of the European family of countries,” she said. “But there is a dictator who is dragging us back into the Soviet Union past.”