Belarus' authoritarian ruler will face only token challengers in presidential vote

News

Belarus' authoritarian ruler will face only token challengers in presidential vote

2024-11-05 06:56 Last Updated At：07:11

TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — Belarus' election commission on Monday allowed seven politicians loyal to President Alexander Lukashenko to start collecting signatures to run against him in January's election, in an apparent bid to create a semblance of competition to the longtime authoritarian ruler.

Lukashenko, who has ruled the country for more than 30 years, is seeking a seventh term following a relentless crackdown on the opposition and free media.

The election, scheduled for Jan. 26, would come 4 1/2 years after the 2020 presidential vote that was rejected by the opposition and the West as rigged with fraud and triggered massive nationwide protests. Belarusian authorities responded to the demonstrations with a sweeping crackdown on dissent, resulting in about 65,000 people arrested.

Major opposition figures were either imprisoned or fled the country in the crackdown. Human rights activists say Belarus now holds about 1,300 political prisoners and that many of them are denied adequate medical care and contact with their families.

Lukashenko has relied on subsidies and political support from his main ally, Russia, to survive the protests. He allowed Moscow to use Belarusian territory to send troops into Ukraine in February 2022.

Last week, Belarus' Central Election Commission registered an initiative group for Lukashenko to prepare for the race. On Monday, it also permitted seven politicians to begin collecting signatures to be able to run, including Sergei Syrankov of the Communist Party, Oleg Gaidukevich, the leader of the Liberal Democratic Party, and former Interior Ministry spokeswoman Olga Chеmоdanova.

“Those are alternative candidates, and I believe they just want to safeguard the incumbent,” Lukashenko said of his aspiring token challengers.

Each of the candidates is required to collect at least 100,000 signatures until Dec. 6 to enter the race.

Last week, the commission refused to register initiative groups for two opposition politicians who aspired to enter the race.

“There are candidates, but no competition in this election,” said Valery Karbalevich, an independent political analyst. “Lukashenko fears a replay of the 2020 protests, his trauma is still fresh and so he will carry out the vote in a format when the result is predetermined.”

Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who is in exile after challenging Lukashenko in the 2020 presidential election, denounced January's vote as a farce and urged Belarusians to vote against all candidates.

“We are offering people to voice their protest by voting against all those who are robbing us of our right to vote,” said Tsikhanouskaya, whose husband Siarhei Tsikhanouski is serving a 19 1/2-year prison sentence after trying to run against Lukashenko. “This is not an election but an imitation of an electoral process held amid terror when alternative candidates and observers aren't allowed.”

During February's parliamentary and local elections, in which only candidates loyal to Lukashenko were allowed to compete, Belarus for the first time also refused to invite observers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe to monitor the vote.

Australian Open: Iga Swiatek is in total control during a 6-1, 6-0 rout of Emma Raducanu

2025-01-18 15:15 Last Updated At：15:22

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Everything came so easily for Iga Swiatek during a 6-1, 6-0 victory over Emma Raducanu on Saturday in the only Australian Open women's third-round match between two past Grand Slam champions — if you thought that meant it would be close, you'd have been rather wrong — that this was how she described it:

“I felt like the ball,” Swiatek said, “is listening to me.”

Loud and clear. Asked to explain that sensation, Swiatek put her two index fingers a few inches apart and said, “It’s just being able to aim for this kind of space.” Then she spread her palms more than a foot apart to show that's the margin for error on other days.

The difference, she said, comes down to “being more precise and actually knowing where the ball is going to go, seeing the effects that you want it to.”

When the five-time major champion and former long-time No. 1-ranked woman — now No. 2, behind Aryna Sabalenka — is at the height of her powers, as she sure has seemed to be in Week 1 at Melbourne Park, it is hard for anyone to slow Swiatek down.

The heavy-spinning, high-bouncing forehands. The squeaky-sneaker scrambling to get to every shot. The terrific returning. And so on.

Later Saturday, No. 4 Taylor Fritz, the runner-up at last year's U.S. Open, became the highest-seeded man to leave the bracket, defeated by 38-year-old Gael Monfils 3-6, 7-5, 7-6 (1), 6-4. Monfils joined Roger Federer as the only men 38 or older to get to the fourth round in Melbourne since the field expanded to 128 players in 1988.

The first man to advance Saturday was 42nd-ranked Alex Michelsen, a 20-year-old Californian who overwhelmed No. 19 Karen Khachanov 6-3, 7-6 (5), 6-2 to earn a debut in the fourth round at a major. It was the second time Michelsen knocked off a top-20 seed this week after beating No. 11 Stefanos Tsitsipas, the 2023 Australian Open runner-up, in the first round.

Michelsen will try to send another high seed packing on Monday when he plays No. 8 Alex de Minaur, an Australian who beat No. 31 Francisco Cerúndolo 5-7, 7-6 (3), 6-3, 6-3.

Against Raducanu, who won the 2021 U.S. Open as a teenage qualifier, Swiatek played at a level she called “perfect.”

Indeed, Swiatek mounted a 24-9 edge in winners, made only 12 unforced errors — roughly half of Raducanu's 22 — and claimed 59 points to 29. That caused one spectator to yell out, “No mercy!” in the second set as Swiatek was reeling off the last 11 games after the match was tied at 1-all early with not a cloud in the sky and the temperature approaching 80 degrees Fahrenheit (above 25 Celsius).

“I think it was a little bit of her playing well, and me not playing so well,” Raducanu said. “That combination is probably not good.”

Fair.

Swiatek, who agreed to accept a one-month suspension in a doping case late last year, owns four trophies from the French Open and one from the U.S. Open. But she’s never been beyond the semifinals in Australia; she lost in that round to Danielle Collins in 2022.

A year ago, Swiatek was upset in the third round by teenager Linda Noskova.

Swiatek, who said she dedicated Saturday's win to her grandfather, has ceded a total of only 10 games through three matches with new coach Wim Fissette sitting courtside. Next up will be 128th-ranked Eva Lys of Germany, who lost in qualifying but was given a spot in the main draw when someone withdrew about 10 minutes before her first-round match.

Lys defeated Jaqueline Cristian 4-6, 6-3, 6-3 and is the first “lucky loser” to get to the Australian Open's fourth round since the tournament moved to Melbourne Park in 1988.

Others who now will get a chance to play for a quarterfinal berth after victories Saturday included No. 6 Elena Rybakina, No. 8 Emma Navarro and No. 9 Daria Kasatkina. Rybakina, the 2022 Wimbledon champion, beat No. 32 Dayana Yastremska 6-3, 6-4, Navarro eliminated three-time major finalist Ons Jabeur 6-4, 3-6, 6-4, and Kasatkina got past No. 24 Yulia Putintseva 7-5, 6-1.

Navarro, who reached her first major semifinal at Flushing Meadows in September, has now won all three of her matches in Melbourne this year in three sets.

That means she has been involved in 30 tour-level three-setters since the start of last season, the most of any female player.

“I love three sets. I love tennis so much, I can't resist,” joked Navarro, who grew up in South Carolina and won an NCAA singles title at the University of Virginia. “I just wanted to stick in there and keep believing in myself.”