People choose prison and exile, Belarus President Lukashenko told the BBC

I have reported a lot of elections.

I have seen Prime Ministers and Presidents gather in polling stations, vote and then answer a few questions to reporters.

But I have never seen anything similar on the stage in the 478 election section in Minsk.

The longtime leader of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko, once called the “last dictator of Europe,” arrived to vote. Then, while the Belarusi still voted, candidate Lukashenko gave four and a half hours of live live television.

It was an opportunity to question him about the controversial vote that his critics condemned as a “fraud”.

“What a pathetic question did you prepare for me?” He asked. – As you always do.

“Good morning,” I said.

– Good morning, Steve.

“How can you call this democratic choices when your main rivals are either in prison or in exile? I asked.

“Some are in prison and others are in exile. But you are here!” Lukashenko said.

“Everyone has a choice. This is democracy. Some have chosen prison, others exile. We have never made anyone leave the country.”

In fact, the brutal repression of the authorities against the 2020 presidential election protesters has led to Alexander Lukashenko’s hardest opponents to be imprisoned or sent to political exile. Personal choice does not come into this.

“You recently said,” We don’t have to close people’s mouths “(silence people),” I reminded him.

“But your rivals were not only kept outside the newsletter. Some of them were imprisoned. There are currently more than 1,200 political prisoners in Belarus. Isn’t it time to open the prison cells and release them? People like Maria Kolesnikova, Sergei Tihanovski … “

“You keep telling me about Maria. Lord, “Lukashenko sighed.

“Okay, I’ll answer your question … The prison is for people who have opened their mouth too wide and violated the law. Do you have no prisons in the UK and America? “

“In every country, if you violate the law, you have to bear the consequences,” he continued. “The law is strict, but it is a law. I have not invented it. You must obey it.”

“You have to obey the law,” I said. “But these people are in prison because they criticized you.

“The ignorance of the law does not release you from responsibility before him.”

Although prominent opposition figures were not allowed to run, the name of Alexander Lukashenko was not the only one in the newsletter. There were four more candidates. But they came across more spoilers than serious contenders.

“We talked to some of the other candidates,” I told Lukashenko. “One of them, the leader of the Communist Party, openly supports you. Another praised you. Strange choices, right, with such opponents … “

“Steve, this is a whole new experience for you!” He replied, challenged by laughter and applause by local journalists in the room.

“That’s true,” I said. “I have not seen such elections so far.

“Communist policy, based on justice, is the same policy that we encourage,” Lukashenko said. “Then why will they vote against me?”

European Union High Representative for Foreign Policy Kaya Callas has identified this presidential election in Belarus as a “outspoken insult to democracy.”

Not that Alexander Lukashenko seems to be interested in.

“I swear,” he told me, “I don’t care if you will admit our election or not. The most important thing for me is the people of Belarus to admit it. “