December 19, Pozirk. Alaksandar Łukašenka admitted yesterday that authorities deliberately withhold passports from pardoned dissidents who are taken out of the country.
The politician made this statement at the seventh All-Belarusian People’s Assembly in Minsk.
“We don’t need them [those convicted on political grounds]. If they are your people, take them away, for God’s sake, take them wherever you want and do whatever you want. . . Are we supposed to issue passports to our enemies?” said Łukašenka, who had earlier banned Belarusian embassies from providing passport services abroad.
Those regime critics who had been taken out of Belarus would not be able to return so that they would not cause problems, the Belarusian ruler said, referring to the 2020 postelection protests. Łukašenka added that he did not accept Washington’s offer to allow pardoned prisoners to remain in Belarus.
Moreover, he threatened to ban all emigrants from entering Belarus. “We will prohibit all movement of these people here . . . [They wanted to] emigrate — try this. If you want, go to [Prosecutor General Andrej] Švied, to the commission [for return of emigrants]. If they say yes, it means yes, if they say no, it means no.”
