Belarus asks Lithuania to extradite opposition leader

According to ALJAZEERA, Belarus says it has requested the extradition of exiled opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, who was forced from the country last year amid a crackdown on critics of leader Alexander Lukashenko.

Tikhanovskaya, who challenged Lukashenko in a presidential vote last August that the opposition denounced as rigged, sought refuge in neighbouring Lithuania as Lukashenko moved to stifle dissent in the wake of his controversial election win.

The Belarus General Prosecutor’s Office said on Friday it had requested that Lithuania, a European Union member state, extradite her “to face prosecution for crimes against the governing order, public safety and the state”.

Investigators had earlier in the week accused Tikhanovskaya, who stood in the August vote in place of her jailed husband, of planning with associates to instigate riots and capture government buildings in Gomel, Belarus’s second-most populous city.

Tikhanovskaya has dismissed the allegations.

Lithuania’s Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis responded that his country “has been and will be a brick wall behind which all democratic forces persecuted by regimes will find refuge”.

“We can say only one thing to the Belarusian regime: hell will first have to freeze over before we consider your requests,” he said.

Belarus’s move to launch extradition proceedings came after Tikhanovskaya on Wednesday said she expected mass protests against Lukashenko to start up again in the spring following a bout of rallies that erupted in the immediate aftermath of last year’s election.