BELARUSIAN authorities today brought military trucks and barbed wire into central Minsk ahead of a planned opposition march, a day after police detained hundreds of women demonstrators.

The opposition movement calling for an end to the regime of authoritarian leader Alexander Lukashenko has kept up a wave of large-scale demonstrations every Sunday since his disputed win in the August 9 polls.

The latest opposition protests were set to begin at 2pm, with opposition social media calling for demonstrators to gather in central Minsk as well as other cities.

Belarusian opposition news sites posted video and photos of a convoy of military trucks and vehicles with rolls of barbed wire driving into the centre ahead of the demonstration.

The protest comes after riot police cracked down on peaceful women demonstrators yesterday. They were wearing shiny accessories for their so-called Sparkly March.

They dragged protesters into vans, lifted some women off their feet and carried them.

Belarusian Interior Ministry spokesman Olga Chemodanova said this morning police had detained 415 people in Minsk and 15 in other cities for breaking rules on mass demonstrations. She said 385 had been released.

Chemodanova warned Belarusians they could face criminal charges for organising such protests.

‘Escalation of violence’

The number of detentions yesterday was far higher than at a similar protest last week, prompting the opposition’s Coordination Council to warn of a “new phase in the escalation of violence against peaceful protesters”.

Among those detained was one of the most prominent faces of the protest movement, 73-year-old activist Nina Baginskaya, although she was later released. 

The aggressive police tactics prompted an opposition Telegram channel, Nexta, which has more than two million subscribers, to publish what it said was a list of the names and ranks of more than 1,000 police.

Protesters have sought to expose the identity of police who appear at demonstrations in plain clothes or in uniforms without insignia or name badges, trying to pull off their masks and balaclavas.

Opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, who claimed victory over Lukashenko in the polls and has taken shelter in Lithuania, yesterday said Belarusians were ready to strip police obeying “criminal orders” of anonymity.

A female anchor on state television channel Belarus 1 criticised the women protesters yesterday evening, asking: “How did these women get so aggressive? After all nature intended them to guard their hearth.”

The broadcast made no mention of police detentions.

Lukashenko has dismissed opposition calls for his resignation and sought help from Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has promised law enforcement backup if needed and a US$1.5 billion (RM6.1 billion) loan.

Tikhanovskaya is set to meet European Union foreign ministers in Brussels tomorrow as the EU prepares sanctions against those it blames for rigging the election and the regime’s violent crackdown on protesters.

Authorities have jailed many of Tikhanovskaya’s allies who formed the leadership of the Coordination Council or driven them out of the country.

One of her campaign partners, Maria Kolesnikova, has been imprisoned and charged with undermining national security. – AFP, September 20, 2020.