Alexander Lukashenko takes action against critics with great severity. The Olympian Kristina Timanowskaja also fell victim to his thirst for revenge and had to give up her dream at the Olympics.
The case of Belarusian Olympian Kristina Timanovskaya made headlines around the world. According to the opinion of the Belarusian opposition, the sprinter should be kidnapped from Tokyo by the authoritarian authorities of the dictator Alexander Lukashenko. After publicly criticizing Belarusian sports officials for being flown out of Japan against her will, the 24-year-old said in a video published by the opposition Belarusian athletes’ association Belarusian Sport Solidarity Foundation (BSSF) on Sunday. The BSSF spoke of an attempted “violent” exit.
The incident is just one of a series of insane acts by the Belarusian dictator. Shortly before Timanovskaya dared to express her criticism, Lukashenko had raged against the athletes in his country. During a meeting in which he announced a few new political cadres, the ruler said against the Olympians: “We invest in sports more than any other country,” he began his failure with an outright lie. “But what did that lead to? We invest in sport, but have forgotten that the country and the people want to see athletes with medals.”
His solution: “We have to select individual teams and athletes from the whole mass of athletes in whom we invest a lot of money and invest in them so that there is a result tomorrow. That has not happened so far,” said Lukashenko. Reforms in this area are urgently needed. He cited Serbia as an example worth emulating. According to the dictator, the Serbs are a “talented nation” just like the Belarusians, but the results are different. “Because they know: if they win the Olympic Games or the World Championships, then they will have everything. And if they don’t win, they know that they will have to look for a piece of bread. But we will finance them all.”
Especially athletes whom the dictator suspects of sympathizing with the opposition are a thorn in his side. “At the soccer championship, some soccer players received large amounts of money. Why would their wives have to work? They prefer to sit there and play with their iPhones. And they are all for the red-white-red flag [ein Symbol der Opposition, Anm. d. Redaktion]. Out of boredom. This is not just my conclusion. There are people who see these processes and ask me directly: Who are we paying for? “, Says Lukashenko.
“If you don’t win anything, you’d better not go back to this country”
As early as 2019, he threatened the athletes and sports officials in his country if they did not win medals at the Olympic Games in Tokyo. “Think carefully before you go there as a chief trainer, consultant or specialist. Think about whether you should go there at all,” said Lukashenko at the time. “Because if nothing wins, you better not return to this country. I will tell you this as the country’s president. Understand me as you wish,” the Belarusian ruler uttered an open threat.
The sprinter Timanovskaya has not only not won a medal, but has also criticized the officials of the regime. She had complained that other Belarusian athletes could not compete in the Tokyo Games because insufficient negative doping samples had been submitted for them. As a result, Timanovskaya should compete in several disciplines for which she was not prepared. After the public criticism, the sprinter was ordered back and Belarusian state media denigrated her as a traitor.
The past few weeks have shown how ruthless and brutal Lukashenko is against critics. In Belarus, for example, several people were sentenced for just hanging white sheets of paper in their windows. The regime sees this as a sign of support for the opposition. Those affected now have to serve 14 to 28 days in prison.
A huge campaign against independent media is rolling across the country. Journalists are arrested, media houses smashed or classified as extremist, as in the case of the opposition television station Belsat. The Poland-based broadcaster reported last year on the mass protests against the controversial re-election of Lukashenko. In February, two Belsat employees were sentenced to two years in prison for reporting on the demonstrations.
Lukashenko mutes all critics
The Belarusian authorities have been taking action against Lukashenko’s opponents, journalists and activists for months in order to finally put down the protests. Last week they banned more than 40 non-governmental organizations and associations. Information portals such as tut.by were blocked and lost their license, and even accounting employees went to jail.
“One gets the impression that on the anniversary the government set the task of being able to announce the complete cleansing of all dissenters,” said Boris Gorezky, deputy head of the Belarusian Union of Journalists, the Ukrainian broadcaster Unian TV. Meant is the anniversary of the presidential elections on August 9, 2020, after which protests broke out across the country last year.
The case of Roman Protassewitsch clearly shows that regime critics are not safe abroad either: The blogger was flying from Athens to Vilnius in May when Lukashenko had the plane forced to land. The incident sparked an international scandal and a wave of new sanctions against Belarus.
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