Belarusian democracy movement
Encyclopedia
Background
Alexander LukashenkoAlexander Lukashenko
Alexander Grigoryevich Lukashenko has been serving as the President of Belarus since 20 July 1994. Before his career as a politician, Lukashenko worked as director of a state-owned agricultural farm. Under Lukashenko's rule, Belarus has come to be viewed as a state whose conduct is out of line...
has ruled the country with an iron fist since 1994. United Nations Human Rights Council noted that Belarusian political system is “incompatible with the concept of human rights”.
Charter 97
Charter 97Charter 97
Charter 97 is a declaration calling for democracy in Belarus and a human rights group taking its inspiration from the declaration.The document - whose title deliberately echoes the Czechoslovak human rights declaration Charter 77 twenty years earlier - was created on the anniversary of a referendum...
is a declaration calling for democracy in Belarus
Belarus
Belarus , officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe, bordered clockwise by Russia to the northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Its capital is Minsk; other major cities include Brest, Grodno , Gomel ,...
and a human rights
Human rights
Human rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...
group taking its inspiration from the declaration. The document - whose title deliberately echoes the Czechoslovak human rights declaration Charter 77
Charter 77
Charter 77 was an informal civic initiative in communist Czechoslovakia from 1976 to 1992, named after the document Charter 77 from January 1977. Founding members and architects were Václav Havel, Jan Patočka, Zdeněk Mlynář, Jiří Hájek, and Pavel Kohout. Spreading the text of the document was...
twenty years earlier - was created on the anniversary of a referendum held in 1996, and which, in the words of the organisation of the same name, declares: "devotion to the principles of independence, freedom and democracy, respect to the human rights, solidarity with everybody, who stands for elimination of dictatorial regime and restoration of democracy in Belarus."
Jeans Revolution
The Jeans RevolutionJeans Revolution
The Jeans Revolution was a term used by the democratic opposition in Belarus and their supporters in the West to describe their effort and aspirations as regarding democratic changes in Belarus at the presidential elections of 2006...
was a term used by the democratic opposition in Belarus
Belarus
Belarus , officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe, bordered clockwise by Russia to the northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Its capital is Minsk; other major cities include Brest, Grodno , Gomel ,...
and their supporters to describe their effort and aspirations as regarding democratic changes in Belarus at the presidential elections of 2006.
2010 Presidential election
After the Belarusian presidential election, 2010, up to 40,000 people protested against Lukashenko. Up to 700 opposition activists, including 7 presidential candidates, were arrested in the post election crackdown.Several websites of the opposition and opposition candidates were also blocked or hacked. Facebook
Facebook
Facebook is a social networking service and website launched in February 2004, operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. , Facebook has more than 800 million active users. Users must register before using the site, after which they may create a personal profile, add other users as...
Twitter
Twitter is an online social networking and microblogging service that enables its users to send and read text-based posts of up to 140 characters, informally known as "tweets".Twitter was created in March 2006 by Jack Dorsey and launched that July...
, YouTube
YouTube
YouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....
, Google talk
Google Talk
Google Talk is a freeware voice over Internet protocol client application offered by Google Inc. The first beta version of the program was released on August 24, 2005...
, many email
Email
Electronic mail, commonly known as email or e-mail, is a method of exchanging digital messages from an author to one or more recipients. Modern email operates across the Internet or other computer networks. Some early email systems required that the author and the recipient both be online at the...
services and LiveJournal
LiveJournal
LiveJournal is a virtual community where Internet users can keep a blog, journal or diary. LiveJournal is also the name of the free and open source server software that was designed to run the LiveJournal virtual community....
were also blocked. The headquarters of Charter97, an opposition group and website, was stormed by the KGB and all its staff were arrested.
According to the Independent, Lukashenko's security forces went after his opponents "with a ferocity that would not have looked out of place in Soviet times".
2011 protests
A series of protests influenced by the Arab SpringArab Spring
The Arab Spring , otherwise known as the Arab Awakening, is a revolutionary wave of demonstrations and protests occurring in the Arab world that began on Saturday, 18 December 2010...
took place in 2011. As a result of these protests, on 29 July, the government banned assemblies and gatherings.
Organizations
- The European UnionEuropean UnionThe European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
has enforced sanctions against the Lukashenko regime.
People
- Actors Kevin SpaceyKevin SpaceyKevin Spacey, CBE is an American actor, director, screenwriter, producer, and crooner. He grew up in California, and began his career as a stage actor during the 1980s, before being cast in supporting roles in film and television...
, Jude LawJude LawDavid Jude Heyworth Law , known professionally as Jude Law, is an English actor, film producer and director.He began acting with the National Youth Music Theatre in 1987, and had his first television role in 1989...
, Roger Lloyd PackRoger Lloyd PackRoger Lloyd-Pack is an English actor known for his roles in the TV shows The Vicar of Dibley, Only Fools and Horses and The Old Guys.-Career:...
, and playwright Sir Tom StoppardTom StoppardSir Tom Stoppard OM, CBE, FRSL is a British playwright, knighted in 1997. He has written prolifically for TV, radio, film and stage, finding prominence with plays such as Arcadia, The Coast of Utopia, Every Good Boy Deserves Favour, Professional Foul, The Real Thing, and Rosencrantz and...
joined street protests in LondonLondonLondon is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
against the dictatorship in 2011.