Incumbent Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko swept to a landslide victory in Sunday’s presidential election taking 86.82% of votes, according to preliminary results, said the Central Election Commission Chairman Igor Karpenko at a press conference on January 26.

"You can congratulate the Republic of Belarus, we have elected a president," he said reports TASS.

Lukashenko officially won 80.10% of the vote in the massively falsified 2020 election and has improved his standing in these elections, after five years of mounting repression that has crushed any opposition to his rule.

Out of the four other candidates that stood against him, Liberal Democratic Party Chairman Oleg Gaidukevich garnered 2.02% of the vote; entrepreneur Hanna Kanopatskaya received 1.86%, slightly improving her standing from the 1.7% she won in the previous elections; First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Belarusian Communist Party Sergey Syrankov was backed by 3.21% of the voters; while Republican Party of Labour and Justice Chairman Alexander Khizhnyak had 1.74% of the vote. A total of 3.6% of voters voted against all candidates, TASS reports.

The CEC claimed that voter turnout was 85.7% turnout, despite polls in the run-up the poll predicting that turnout would be half the previous election; an estimation borne out by early voting in this election.

On the evening of January 25, the country's CEC announced the end of early voting, which lasted five days, and saw a turnout of 41.81% of the total number of voters included in the voting lists.

Lukashenko cast his vote "for everyone" on polling day at a polling station in the building of the Belarusian State University of Physical Culture.

The “last dictator in Europe” has been in power since 1994 and has relied on subsidies and political support from close ally Russia to stay in power and keep his neo-Soviet system afloat.

"It's better to have a dictatorship like in Belarus than a democracy like Ukraine," Lukashenko said at a four-hour long press conference after casting his vote.

He also repeated declarations that he will leave office and wasn´t clinging to power. “I will quietly and calmly hand it over to the new generation,” Lukashenko told journalists. His 20-year-old son, Nikolai, has been on the campaign trail with his father and is a possible successor, analysts say.

Lukashenko ran against four other candidates, three of which were widely seen as stool pigeons. The fourth, challenger, Hanna Kanapatskaya, was seen as a token nod to a liberal opposition, but only managed to secure 1.7% of the vote in 2020. She said she's the "only democratic alternative to Lukashenko," promising to lobby for freeing political prisoners but warning supporters against "excessive initiative."

Opposition leader-in-exile Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, who fled Belarus under government pressure after challenging the president in 2020, told The Associated Press that Sunday's election was "a senseless farce, a Lukashenko ritual."

"The repressions have become even more brutal as this vote without choice has approached, but Lukashenko acts as though hundreds of thousands of people are still standing outside his palace," she told AP.

Belarus initially had refused to allow the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) to monitor the elections, but Minsk changed its mind at the last minute and offered an invitation – but after it was already too late to organise a monitoring mission.

No protests expected

Lukashenko said on Sunday that his country was not expecting any protests following the presidential election and his political opponents had "chosen" to go to prison as he cast his vote in an election that was set to extend his 31-year rule.

"No, we are not expecting any protests," Lukashenko said speaking to journalists after casting his vote in the presidential election.

"Today, Belarus is already different, it knows where to go, it understands its course. Even without me, no one will stray from this path. We are not determining our fate today; we have long decided it, and this one day [of the election] is ours. We have already built something that will remain for the people," Lukashenko noted.

Lukashenko has freed more than 250 political prisoners in the past year on what he called humanitarian grounds, but human rights group Viasna reports that 1,250 other prisoners remain in jail – including all the most prominent prisoners that ran against Lukashenko in the hotly disputed August 2020 elections that ended with mass demonstrations. Those political opponents that were not arrested are all now in self-imposed political exile.

Lukashenko said that leading dissident Maria Kolesnikova, who supported Belarusian opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya’s campaign, who is believed to be the real winner of the 2020 elections, was guilty of "violating the regime". She has been in jail for more than two years after refusing to flee the country, but has been rarely seen since then and is reportedly in poor health. Lukashenko said she was in sound health and that he had intervened personally to allow her a visit from her father last year.

Another prominent former presidential candidate, Viktor Babariko, who was jailed well before the 2020 vote was held, was also seen for the first time in two years in January, after he was allowed to release a video address to his family just before the current elections were held.

Nobel Peace Prize laureate Ales Bialiatski, founder of the Viasna Human Rights Centre, is also in a Belarusian jail on trumped up charges.

Belarus won’t merge with Russia

Lukashenko said he discusses the future with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, but there has been no talk of merging the two countries into one state.

"Yes, we discuss how we will live, how we will cooperate," Lukashenko told journalists, “But there has been no talk about us merging into a single state.”

Moscow and Minsk signed off on a Union State deal in 1999 that is designed to create a common market, but progress on putting the deal into place has moved very slowly. Nevertheless, Russia and Belarus recently increased security ties.

Lukashenko said that Belarus will receive a Russian Oreshnik ballistic missile system very soon.

Lukashenko expressed his "dream" of positioning an Oreshnik missile system closer to the city of Smolensk (Russia). He noted that the targets for the missile system should not be located too close or too far from it.

Lukashenko suggested placing the Oreshnik missile system "somewhere near Russia", emphasising that it is considered "a joint weapon".

In December 2024, Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin announced that Oreshnik missile systems might be deployed in Belarus in 2025.

The Belarusian strongman let Russian forces cross his territory in a northern invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and hosts Russian military bases and a few of Russia's tactical nuclear weapons, but he still campaigned on the slogan "Peace and security," arguing he has saved Belarus from being drawn into war.

Free election?

The European Parliament urged the European Union to reject the election outcome. EU's top diplomat Kaja Kallas called the vote "a blatant affront to democracy."

At a four-hour press conference with Lukashenko, the first question Lukashenko answered was related to the EP resolution calling on European countries not to recognise the results of the elections. Even before the elections, the head of the Central Election Commission of the Republic, Igor Karpenko, declared the EP's interference in the electoral sovereignty of the country.

Lukashenko said that he doesn't care whether the European Union recognises the elections in Belarus or not; the main thing is that the voters themselves do it.

"Whether you recognise these elections there in the European Union or not is a matter of taste. As you say, I don't care whether you recognise our elections or not. The main thing for me is that Belarusians recognise these elections and that they end peacefully, as they began," he said, reports Vedomosti.

Nevertheless, Lukashenko has for decades flirted with the EU in an attempt to play both sides of the fence and give himself some leverage in his deals with Moscow. He is believed to still be interested in improving relations in an effort to win some sanctions relief and end his complete isolation.

BBC journalist Steve Rosenberg pointed out to Lukashenko that some of his rivals in the elections support and even praise the current head of state, and a race with such rivals, in his opinion, looks strange.

"Steve, this is a new experience for you," the president replied. The room then erupted in laughter.

Rosenberg also asked how these elections could be called democratic when Lukashenko's rivals are in prison or in exile. "Some are in prison, some are in exile, and so on, and you are here – this is the right to choose," Lukashenko said, adding that the authorities did not expel anyone from the country, but, on the contrary, opened it up.

 

Will Trump make a difference?
 

The Belarusian leader was asked about his “hopes” in connection with Donald Trump’s arrival in the White House.

Lukashenko pointed out there as a possible non-recognition of the British Prime Minister's authority, but noted that "nothing will happen" there, and nothing will happen in Belarus either.

"If tomorrow the US makes a statement or remains silent at least about our elections, what will you do? You are used to it, you have been bullying Trump from morning till night," he said.

With the arrival of Trump, the problems will not be in Belarus, but in Europe, and they have already begun, the president said.

When and how will the war in Ukraine end?

The Russian-Ukrainian conflict will be resolved this year, the President of Belarus believes. "There will be some resolution this year... the conflict will probably continue for a long time. But there will be a resolution. The light at the end of the tunnel will appear this year," he said.

Lukashenko said that all positions of the parties to the conflict, including Russia, must be taken into account: "No America will ever force Russia. Trump is not an idiot, not a fool, he will not say that to [Russian President Vladimir] Putin. And if he does, it will be harmful." According to him, a compromise is needed. This could be a stop to the fighting on the contact line, the Belarusian leader believes.

Only Belarusian peacekeepers could ensure normal relations between Russia and Ukraine, the president of the republic believes.

A possible peacekeeping mission by Western countries to protect borders in the event of a ceasefire in Ukraine will fail as, "they have nothing". But this does not mean that Minsk will send its military to the neighbouring country. Other armies, Lukashenko believes, "will be pulled either to the West or to the East", so an agreement can only be reached on Belarusian peacekeepers.

"But, so that you understand, I am not rushing there, and, most likely, I am not going to send my people there (as of today) – peacekeepers. I am not going to. But the Belarusians can only ensure normal relations between the middle and elder brothers," the president said.

Polish threats

Poland is pursuing an aggressive policy towards Belarus today after it took over the chairmanship of the EU Council in January and “is gearing up for an intervention,” Lukashenko said at the press conference after casting his vote in the presidential election.

In response to a question from a Polish correspondent, Lukashenko said: "You are preparing to stage an intervention against us," adding that the current Polish authorities are currently training on their territory Belarusian oppositionists.

The Belarusian president added that "Poland is pursuing the most aggressive and destructive policies regarding Belarus."

"You lay claims today on Western Belarus that stretches out to Minsk and talks about Western Ukraine are also underway," Lukashenko said.

"You must understand that you will not even get a meter of territory from us. This is our territory," the Belarusian president added.