On 30 May, the Danish visa centre in Minsk announced a temporary shutdown of its visa application service in Belarus, suspending the issue of visas and resident permits. The visa centre suggested applicants use visa processing services in other...
Stanislau Shushkevich, the first leader of independent Belarus, who signed the Belavezha Accords to dissolve the Soviet Union, died on 3 May 2022. Just one week later, his Ukrainian counterpart, Leonid Kravchuk, also passed away. Both leaders’ lives reflected...
On 3 April 2022, Belarusian authorities lifted the rigid restrictions on border crossings in force since late 2020. Just as Minsk had taken its own approach in handling Covid-19, it had also developed a unique travel restriction system. Instead...
On 23 April, The Washington Post wrote about a clandestine Belarusian network of railway workers and dissidents who helped to stop Russia’s assault on Kyiv. Since the start of the war, certain Belarusians have disrupted the transit of Russian equipment through...
The number of political prisoners in Belarus appears to have increased by 550 per cent in just over a year. As of 12 April, human rights defenders estimate their total at 1,118 people. The cost of protesting and demonstrating...
On 3 March, riot police detained mothers of Belarusian soldiers who had gathered at the Holy Spirit Cathedral in Minsk to pray for peace. On 25 March, Belarusian Greek Catholic priest Vasil Jahorau from Bialynichy was fined €440 ($487)...
As Russia invaded Ukraine in the early hours of 24 February, reactions across the former Soviet Union (FSU) ranged from anxiety to terror. FSU countries once again feel exposed to the Russian, imperial powers that suppressed them during the...
On 1 March 2018, Minsk municipal authorities granted a permission to install a memorial plaque on the historical building, where on 25 March 1918 Belarusian independence was proclaimed. On the following day, Belarusians crowdfunded the project, promptly collecting €...
On 6 February 2018, the Viciebsk district court fined Jan Diaržaucau for the unauthorized burial of Stalinist terror victims’ remains in the forest near the village of Hajsy. Even though the initial discovery of human remains at Hajsy dates...
In the Polish town Oświęcim, on the eve of the 73rd anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, the district court passed sentence. The case concerned a nude performance last spring near the memorial to the Nazi death camp. Twelve...
While the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements gained momentum in the West, Belarusian society remained on the margins of the raging global debates of sexual harassment. Yet public discussions of harassment, abuse, and gender-based violence are not new phenomena for...
On 28 November 2017, participants of the Russian political talk-show Mesto Vstrechi , compared Belarus to an ‘unfaithful wife,’ a ‘prostitute’ and a ‘second Ukraine.’ The show reflected angry reactions to the participation of Belarus in the recent...
This October, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenka complained about “mountains of rubbish in Belarus visible from space.” Noting a particular problem with the accumulation of rubbish in the capital, the president urged the development of new long-term approaches to waste...
On 17 November 2017, German Foreign Minister Siegmar Gabriel has visited Minsk to take part in the Minsk Forum – an unofficial dialogue platform between Belarus, Germany and the EU, running since 1997. Gabriel also met with his Belarusian...
In early November 2017, Belarusians remembered two important dates in their 20th-century history: the October Revolution and the Great Terror. On 5 November, a traditional Dziady manifestation commemorated the Stalinist repression victims in Kurapaty – the place where the...