The European Union announced on Thursday 24 September, in a statement by the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell, that it does not recognise Alexander Lukashenko as President of Belarus for a new term.
On the previous day, Mr Lukashenko was inaugurated as President of Belarus for a sixth term in a secret ceremony.
Recalling that the EU does not recognise the “falsified results” of the 9 August presidential election, which was, in his view, “neither free nor fair”, the High Representative explained that “on this basis, the so-called ‘inauguration’ of 23 September and the new mandate claimed by Alexander Lukashenko lack any democratic legitimacy”.
According to Borrell, the nomination “directly contradicts the will of large parts of the population” and only further deepens the political crisis.
On the other hand, an inclusive national dialogue and a positive response to Belarusians’ demands for new democratic elections are “the only way forward in finding a way out of the serious political crisis in the country that respects the wishes of the Belarusian people”, the High Representative said. He said the EU’s position is “clear”: Belarusians deserve the right to be represented by those they freely choose in new elections that are “inclusive, transparent and credible”. The Europeans therefore express their solidarity with the people and fully support their democratic right to elect their President through new free and fair elections under the supervision of the OSCE.
The Belarusian authorities, for their part, must immediately refrain from further repression and violence against the people and immediately and unconditionally release all those detained, including political prisoners, demands the High Representative.
In light of the current situation, the EU is reviewing its relations with Belarus, Mr Borrell warned.
The Chairman of the European Parliament’s delegation for relations with Belarus, Robert Biedroń (S&D, Poland), and the rapporteur on Belarus, Petras Auštrevičius (Renew Europe, Lithuania), also reacted to Mr Lukashenko’s inauguration. “The European Parliament does not recognise Alexander Lukashenko as President of Belarus at the end of his fifth term”, they announced, referring to Parliament’s resolution of 17 September (see EUROPE 12562/24). “The hasty (inauguration) ceremony is yet another desperate attempt to usurp power, a farce that obviously has no legal value”, they added, again calling for an inclusive national dialogue.
In the face of such criticism, Mr Lukashenko did not bat an eye. “They're shouting that they don’t recognise us. You know, we never asked them to recognise us, to recognise our elections, to recognise our re-elected president”, he said, according to the Belarusian state agency Belta. Mr Lukashenko was speaking about himself in the first person plural. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)