Tuesday September 7th 2021 | 20:00 – 21:30 | Instituto Cervantes Utrecht
Alexandr Lukashenko has been the president of Belarus since 1994. After being president of Belarus for such a long time, Lukashenko became a popular topic in the international media after he was re-elected in August 2020. Critics believed that the 2020 re-election as well as earlier re-elections were fraudulent and that Lukashenko retained his power by pursuing a repressive regime. This idea sparked massive protests to emerge in Belarus, where the opposition of Lukashenko advocated for new and fair elections. However, Lukashenko chose to remain in power by arresting thousands of protesters in a violent way, with help of the police and security forces. The European Union reacted shocked and implemented sanctions on Belarus with the aim to stop the violence and to guarantee basic human rights in the country, while president Putin of Russia on the opposite tightened its ties with Lukashenko. International tumult continued this year after Lukashenko intercepted an airplane on its way to Greece and forced the airplane to land in Minsk to arrest a journalist that was critical of Lukashenko’s regime.
On the 7th of September we will talk about the political situation in Belarus and the possible scenarios with respect to the future of the country together with Bob Deen and Niels Drost.Bob Deen is a Senior Research Fellow at the Clingendael Institute and is coordinator of the Russia and Eastern Europe centre, where he focuses on international security issues, geopolitics and inter-ethnic conflict. Together with his intern Niels Drost the report ‘Ramifications of Further Integration Belarus and Russia’ was written. During the lecture Bob Deen and Niels Drost will tell us more about this report in which they focus on different scenarios for the future of Belarus with respect to the political situation.
This evening will be free of charge. It will be in-person, but due to COVID-19 measures we only have limited capacity.This is also subject to change depending on the governmental measures. A sign up link will follow shortly.