#belarus 2020

[thequeerness]

as someone who comes from a country with a *literal* dictator in power, it's so funny seeing posts about how european democratic countries are turning into dictatorships.

nope. no, they do not.

you can protest.

your internet is not being turned off every time you do.

your petitions are considered and receive replies.

you're not afraid of being tortured if you're arrested.

you know you'll get out after your arrest.

you have no political prisoners.

you can speak up online and know that after that you will not end up in jail.

you can donate whoever the hell you want.

you can follow online whoever you want.

you did the have to emigrate out of safety concerns.

you can VOTE! and your vote will not be stolen right under your nose!

you're worried HOW people will vote, not if the current ruler will just decide to falsify elections whatsoever and then violently suppress every bit of protest that's out there.

you're worried about shitty laws, not that the judicial system basically does not exist and the laws are quite literally ignored to the point of absurd.

i'm sorry, but shitty democracy is still a democracy, and i might never see my grandma again because i can't go to my own country.

i'm just not buying this shit 🙃

[haveyouheardthisband]

[elenitrack]

Nastassia Mironchyk-Ivanova 🇧🇾

Tokyo 2020 Olympics

[czarinakanaeva]

gifs of every rhythmic gymnast at the 2020 olympics

Anastasiia Salos  - 8th Place

[goldenpinof]

and Belarusians keep dying in police departments

[theshatterednotes]

PERMSKY KRAY - Дорогой Человек

[zef-zef]

Lina Filipovich - J. S. Bach - O Mensch bewein dein Sunde gross from: Lina Filipovich - BFHC (Umor Rex, 2022)

[palarnik-superadgame]

Flight Simulator 2020 - Belarus, Деревня Большая Зимница

[unhonestlymirror]

Me reading chapter 53 and getting the Maidan flashbacks

[ammg-old2]

Mr. Lukashenko has tried to position himself for greater things since he rose to power in 1994. In the late 1990s, he helped create a union-state — a confederation of sorts — between Belarus and Russia, which he must have eventually hoped to head once the ailing Russian leader, Boris Yeltsin, departed the scene. But Mr. Yeltsin’s successor turned out to be Mr. Putin, who had no intention of playing second fiddle to the head of a minor European state. Instead, as he accumulated power, Mr. Putin exploited Belarus’s deep economic dependence on Russia, especially on heavily subsidized energy, to peel away its sovereignty. Instead of heading a major world power, Mr. Lukashenko found himself trying to fend off a suffocating Russian embrace.

After Russia illegally seized Crimea in 2014, Mr. Lukashenko’s saw his most promising chance to assert himself. Taking advantage of the estrangement between Russia and the West after the invasion and Russia’s backing of a rebellion in eastern Ukraine, he promoted the Belarus capital, Minsk, as a “neutral” venue for East-West dialogue. The city became the place where the warring parties and Russian and European leaders convened to hammer out a deal to end the crisis. The ensuing deals, christened the Minsk Agreements, spelled out provisions for a cease-fire and the reintegration of the rebellious regions into Ukraine, but were never carried out.

Nevertheless, Mr. Lukashenko had demonstrated Minsk’s potential as a meeting place. In 2018 Mr. Lukashenko inaugurated the Minsk Dialogue Forum, which brought together American, European and Russian foreign policy experts for debates on global issues and provided him a invaluable platform to present himself as a statesman uniquely qualified to ease tensions between Russia and Ukraine.

Mr. Lukashenko’s second opportunity to reduce its reliance on Russia came in the form of Belarus’s booming tech industry. Since the mid-2000s, it has been a key driver of Belarus’s economic growth, accounting for 7 percent of its total G.D.P. by 2020. It was also an important export sector, sending much of its product to the West, and a magnet for Western investors attracted by Belarus’s well-educated population and low wages. The economic dividends helped provide the funds to transform Minsk itself into a comfortable European city, which enhanced its appeal as an East-West meeting place.

But Mr. Lukashenko’s good fortune came to a screeching halt after a few short years — and fully as a consequence of his own actions. His flagrant rigging of the 2020 presidential elections, in which he brazenly claimed to have won with 80 percent of the vote, touched off a huge nationwide protest movement. Mr. Lukashenko’s government detained tens of thousands of citizens. Hundreds were reportedly mistreated or tortured in custody, and dozens of websites were blocked. With his political survival at stake, Mr. Lukashenko turned back to Russia, which was only more than willing to help at the price of his country’s autonomy.

Mr. Putin stepped in to the rescue, backing Mr. Lukashenko’s harsh tactics. He approved a $1.5 billion loan to ease Minsk’s debt burden, sent in “media” experts to help discredit the protesters as pawns of foreign powers, and announced the formation of a Russian “police reserve” that could be deployed to Belarus should the situation further deteriorate.

The crackdown prompted tech workers, who had been at the forefront of the protests, to flee the country in droves. It also made Minsk off limits as a meeting place, as the West levied sanctions and isolated Mr. Lukashenko diplomatically. The situation only grew worse as Russia began using Belarus as a staging ground for the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Mr. Lukashenko, now totally dependent on the Kremlin in his bid to cling to power, was in no position to resist.

Now he has agreed to give refuge to Mr. Prigozhin and some unknown number of his infamous mercenaries who will go to Belarus with him. Mr. Prigozhin cannot feel safe in Belarus knowing the fate of others who have drawn Mr. Putin’s wrath. Mr. Lukashenko won’t benefit in any way from Mr. Prigozhin’s demise on his territory and probably hopes his sojourn is brief. Despite this uneasy arrangement, Mr. Lukashenko will likely not be able to resist the temptation to embellish his role; he’s already claimed to have offered Mr. Putin advice on how to handle the situation. He will endeavor to play the great statesman for as long as he can.

[henk-heijmans]

A shepherd Alexey Usikov drives a horse-drawn carriage, equipped with a battery, headlights, and small potbelly stove, which he crafted out of an old Audi-80, in the village of Knyazhytsy, Belarus, 2020 - by Vasily Fedosenko (1960), Belarusian

[haveyouheardthisband]

[myxomycota]

Myxomycetes Stamps, Belarus, 2020.

photos of Arcyria globosa, Cribraria purpurea, Physarum album, Physarum decipiens and Lamproderma arcyrioides by Yevgeniy Moroz.

[czarinakanaeva]

gifs of every rhythmic gymnast at the 2020 olympics

Belarus - 5th Place

Hanna Haidukevich

Anastasiya Malakanava

Anastasiya Rybakova

Arina Tsitsilina

Karyna Yarmolenka

[antifainternational]

Aliaksandr Reznik is an antifascist from Minsk, Belarus. In October 2020, he was arrested during the uprising against the Lukashenko regime and convicted of “participation in a mass riot.” Aliaksandr is presently serving an eight-year prison sentence.

Write to Aliaksandr (in Belarusian or Russian) here:

Aliaksandr Reznik Penal colony No. 15. 213105, Mahilioŭ, Viejna, Slaŭharadskaja šaša 183 BELARUS

[peonycats]

MISC ART DUMP 3

I tripped over and remembered I actually have a bunch of drawings saved up for larger posts that never came to fruition so have them while they’re within my brain attention span (alot of this shit dates back to 2021 or even 2020 so thats why its so uggo)

from top to bottom, left to right:

Belarus (chillin)

Iran, Afghanistan (Two greatly contrasting viewpoints)

Yemen, bby Oman (Oman got his ass beat by one of Saudi Arabia’s bros and Yemen got conscripted rip)

Somalia, Djibouti, Ethiopia (this is so ancient please don’t look at it)

Tarquinia/Etruria (No idea how accurate the colors are, but I do remember basing the jewelry after actual artifiacts)

Central African Republic/Centrafique (Centrafrique was meant to be a man originally, and this was one of the first drawings I did to try and redesign her!)

Tanzania, Burundi, Uganda, Rwanda, Kenya, South Sudan (Jfc south sudan is yuge)

Malawi (Still not 100% happy with her design, but I still like this!)

Rwanda, Burundi (A Rwandan tourism twitter account liked this)

India, Afghanistan (Fatality)