History of Belarus (1991–present)

The modern history of Belarus began with the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The new Belarusian country struggled with many problems, including post-Soviet debt, nuclear arsenal, and inflation. These factors contributed to the current history of the Republic of Belarus, especially to the current leadership under Alexander Lukashenko, under whom the country's democracy backslided and later turning into a full authoritarian dictatorship.

The lands of present-day Belarus have been part of many states over the centuries, including the Kievan Rus' (especially the Duchy of Polotsk, which is considered the predecessor of Belarusian statehood), the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, whose elites, despite being of Lithuanian origin, became ruthenized (or belarusianized), then the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which caused polinisation of the nobility and parts of burghers, the Russian Empire, which began russification (especially after November and January Uprisings, in which Belarusians fought alongside Poles and Lithuanians). Belarusian territory became a centre of the World War I, Polish-Soviet War, and World War II, during which Belarusians tried either to create their own state (which they briefly established in 1918-1919 as a Belarusian People's Republic), collaborated with Poland, Soviet Union, or Nazi Germany. Ultimately, the USSR managed to incorporate it into its borders as a Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic, ruled by the Communist Party of Byelorussia. The region experienced repression from the communist regime, especially in 1937-1938, 1940-1941, and from 1945 to mid-1950s.

The political changes in Belarus began in the era of Perestroika, a Soviet political reform movement promoted by the First Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev. Censorship became relaxed, the new Soviet authorities freed political prisoners, and the cultural renewal together with the emerging opposition movements.

In 1988, archaeologist Zianon Pazniak discovered the bodies of people killed during the Stalinist Great Purge of 1937-1938. A year later, Pazniak created the Belarusian Popular Front, a pro-Perestroika organization that later became clearly anti-communist.

From March to May 1990, elections to the Supreme Soviet of Byelorussia took place. The opposition Belarusian Popular Front, led by Pazniak, won around 25–37 seats.

The Byelorussian Communist Party itself also experienced changes. On 27 July 1990, the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic declared sovereignty, which was a part of the so-called "parade of sovereignties", in which many other Soviet republics, including Russian Soviet Federatice Socialist Republic, declared sovereignty from the Gorbachev's central authority. On 28 November 1990, Yefrem Sokolov was replaced by Anatoly Malofeyev in the position of First Secretary of the Communist Party of Byelorussia.

In April 1991, anti-government workers' strikes took place. In result, wages increased and trust in the Communist authorities has fallen.

During the August Coup in 1991, the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic's branch of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union supported the putsch. However, once the coup failed, Chairman of the Supreme Council Nikolai Dementey (who was also first secretary of the Communist Party of Byelorussia) was forced to resign from his post, leading to the election of Stanislav Shushkevich, a scientist, who while a member of the CPSU, was not directly tied to the Apparats. Alongside this, he was known previously for his criticism of the Soviet government's disregard for the Chernobyl Disaster.^[8]

On August 25, 1991, the BSSR declared independence from the Soviet Union, becoming the Republic of Belarus. The White-red-white flag was re-adopted, alongside the Pahonia. The CPB was banned, alongside the larger Communist Party of the Soviet Union, while the USSR ceased to exist after Belovezha Accords on 8 December of the same year.

This period of a flawed democracy was known for tensions between reformist social democrats under Shushkevich who wanted a slow but successful transition to capitalism, hardline post-communists, pro-Russian Prime Minister Vyacheslav Kebich, and nationalist opposition under Pazniak.

Belarus experienced inflation and a crisis involving nuclear weapons, which were transferred to Russia as a part of the deal for neutralization of Belarus.

Due to many of the political structures of Belarus being inherited from the BSSR, minus the CPSU's party politics, Belarus between 1991 and 1994 acted as a Parliamentary republic with the Speaker as Head of State. This position was held by Stanislav Shushkevich at first, but was later taken up by Myechyslaw Hryb, a pro-Russian conservative aligned with the Supreme Council.^[9]

In early 1992, the Belarusian Popular Front petitioned the government for early elections, but the Supreme Council rejected the petition, claiming massive irregularities, despite showcasing no evidence for such. As a concession to the opposition, parliamentary elections were set for March 1994. However, electoral reform failed to pass led to an ambiguous state for elections. Concerns stated by other countries, including the United States over continued delays in new elections were dismissed by the largely conservative Supreme Council as "interference in Belarusian affairs."^[10]

A new constitution was adopted on 15 March 1994, leading to the end of the period between the BSSR and modern Belarus.

The first presidential election took place on 23 June and 10 July. The candidates were:

• Alexander Lukashenko, a populist, former anti-corruption commission chairman whose charges led to dismissal of Shushkevich as a Chairman of the Supreme Council in January 1994
• Vyacheslav Kebich, the incumbent Prime Minister of Belarus
• Zianon Pazniak, a nationalist leader of the Belarusian Popular Front and a parliamentary deputy
• Stanislav Shushkevich, former Chairman of the Supreme Council of Belarus and de facto leader of Belarus from 1991 to 1994
• Alaksandar Dubko, a former chairman of the Grodno Regional Executive Committee
• Vasily Novikov, a communist parliamentary deputy

Lukashenko achieved 45.76% and Kebich gained 17.69%. Other candidates received 13.09% (Pazniak), 10.12 (Shushkevich), 6.11 (Dubko) and 4.38 (Novikov). In the second round, Lukashenko won with 80.61% of the votes, while Kebich achieved 14.22%

After becoming a president, Lukashenko signed the Budapest Memorandum on 5 December 1994 along with Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States acting as guarantors and thereby denuclearized the nation.^[11][12]

After his election, Lukashenko began to consolidate power. In March 1995, he proposed a referendum on strengthening his power and changing national symbols from the white-red-white flag and Pahonia to those based on Byelorussian SSR.

On 11 April 1995, Parliament considered the questions for the referendum, approved the date, but approved only the question regarding economic integration with Russia. Lukashenko declared that he would not change his decision and would accept personal responsibility for the referendum, and left the Parliament, announcing that it would be his last discussions with Parliament in its current form. Nineteen MPs from the Belarusian Popular Front, including Zianon Pazniak, Piatro Sadoŭski and others, decided to carry out a hunger strike within Parliament, protesting against the president organizing the referendum despite the parliament's decision. They were beaten and forcibly removed by OMON.^[13] The parliamentarians sued the special forces for battery but were unsuccessful.

In the 1995 parliamentary election, the Supreme Council became dominated by the opposition, and Syamyon Sharetski was elected its chairman.

In the summer, opposition initiated an impeachment against Alexander Lukashenko with 73 of 199 members of the Supreme Council supporting the procedure, citing as a reason constant violating of the constitution and ignoring the ruling of the Supreme Court. The crisis peaked in November, when Lukashenko surrounded the building with units subordinated to him, and the Supreme Court endorsed an impeachment while even Prime Minister Mikhail Chyhir revolted against President Lukashenko. Then, Russia intervened with Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin and some State Duma members acting as mediators between parliamentarians and Lukashenko. They brokered a compromise that led many deputies to withdraw their signatures, effectively halting the impeachment process.

On 24 November 1996, members of parliament tried to gather together to vote against a referendum, but Lukashenko used Police to block them, effectively stripping them from real power, which turned Belarus into a full authoritarian dictatorship. In response, to the growing Lukashenko's power, Belarusian opposition organized mass street protests from March 1996 to April 1997, known as the Minsk Spring or Belarusian Spring, which failed to remove Lukashenko.

In 1999, opposition tried to conduct a new presdiential election on 16 May, which was not recognized by the Electoral Commission and mostly seen as a protest action, after which opposition leaders Yury Zacharanka and Viktar Hanchar disappeared and were presumably killed. Dissidents, led by figures like Ales Bialiatski, Vincuk Viačorka, Anatoly Lebedko and Mikola Statkevich, responded with a demonstration in Minsk called Freedom March on 17 October, after which a number of forcefully-disappeared individuals significantly decreased.

Another demonstration against Lukashenko, called Second Freedom March, took place on 15 March 2000, against integration with Russia and in defence of Belarusian independence. Ten days later, over 500 people were detained by the police.

In 2001, Lukashenko was re-elected as president with 77.39% of the vote, while the main opposition candidate Uładzimir Hančaryk achieved only 16.01%, in elections described as undemocratic by Western observers, but the world was then focused on 11 September 2001 terrorist attack in the United States, so the news from Belarus were obscured by information noise.

Lukashenko abolished term limits following the falsified 2004 constitutional referendum, which allowed him to run for a third time in 2006. On election which happened on 19 March 2006, the opposition coalition United Democratic Forces of Belarus supported Alaksandar Milinkievič, a former Deputy Mayor of Grodno from 1990 to 1996.

The official election results gave Lukashenko 84.44% of the vote, while Milinkievič achieved 6.22%. However, Milinkievič's campaign office asserted that he received 25.6% of the vote, compared to Lukashenko's 47%.^[14] This caused the anti-Lukashenko protests called the Jeans Revolution. Approximately 10,000 people, including members of the United Democratic Forces, Young Front, Belarusian Social Democratic Party (Assembly) and Zubr, gathered at October Square in Minsk.^[15][16][17] They waved the white-red-white flag of independent Belarus, the flag of Europe, and flags of other nations such as Ukraine, Poland, and Russia.^[18] Several hundred protesters remained at the square overnight, with thousands present each evening.^[19] These protests were suppressed by 25 March.

The Russia–Belarus energy dispute began when Russian state-owned gas supplier Gazprom demanded an increase in gas prices paid by Belarus, a country which has been closely allied with Moscow and forms a loose union state with Russia. It escalated on 8 January 2007, when the Russian state-owned pipeline company Transneft stopped pumping oil into the Druzhba pipeline which runs through Belarus because Belarus was siphoning the oil off the pipe without mutual agreement.  On 10 January, Transneft resumed oil exports through the pipeline after Belarus ended the tariff that sparked the shutdown, despite differing messages from the parties on the state of negotiations.

In June 2009, a diplomatic conflict known as the "Milk War" happened. Russia, under then-President Dmitry Medvedev, allegedly attempted to loan Belarus. US$ 500 million to recognize the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Russia also expressed its interest in privatizing the Belarusian milk industry. Belarus responded by seeking negotiations with the European Union on certifying Belarusian milk according to EU regulations. Russia then banned the import of dairy products from Belarus, citing alleged health concerns. The trade conflict ended on June 17, 2009, when Russia announced that it would lift the ban.

Later in 2009, Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko expressed regret for not supporting Russia in recognizing Abkhazia and South Ossetia. The Belarusian House of Representatives sent a fact-finding mission to the disputed regions to study whether or not Belarus should provide diplomatic recognition. Georgia protested the mission and urged Belarus to maintain non-recognition.

The 2010 Belarusian presidential election was marked by another election fraud, with Lukashenko allegedly achieving 80% of the vote, while opposition candidate Andrei Sannikov officially get only 2.45%. Opposition protests errupted again on 10-21 December, and were suppressed by Militsiya and KGB.

From June to October 2011, "silent protests" took place. Protesters stayed in public places but chanted no words. Much of the protesting fervor stemmed from a rapidly degrading economy that Belarus had been facing in the months before the protests.^[20]

During the early 1990s, Belarus had a very contradictory foreign policy, due to the various conflicts between the branches of government. The Foreign Minister at the time, Petr Krauchanka, advanced claims on neighboring Lithuania with a nationalist outlook, while Stanislav Shushkevich rejected such claims, and attempted to guarantee the current borders of the country. The Polish-Belarusian state declaration, signed in October 1991, ended Belarusian claims on Polish territory, and calmed fears amongst the small nationalist movement of Polish irredentism.^[21] The country also experienced friendly relations with the West, which culminated with American President Bill Clinton's first and only visit to Minsk on 15 January 1994.

International politics changed after Lukashenko's rise to power when, after his brief visit to Brussels on 6 March 1995, relations with the European Union and the general West began to deteriorate, while relations with Russia (especially under Vladimir Putin), China and other authoritarian-leaning countries (Azerbaijan, Venezuela under Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro, Federal Republic of Yugoslavia under Slobodan Milošević, Libya under Muammar Gaddafi, or Syria under Ba'athist regime of Hafez and Bashar al-Assad) improved, with Belarus defending those countries' leaders in cases of revolutions (2000, 2011, 2024) and Lukashenko being supported by them during protests against his own rule (2006, 2010, 2017, 2020-2021).

Belarus was classified as "Partly Free" by Freedom House in their reports from 1992–1995, with criticisms including the continued state ownership of media outlets and political conflicts obstructing reform, while changing to "Not Free" in 1996 and staying like that since that year.^[22]