WARSAW, Poland - February 2, 2011 - Poland‘s foreign minister warned Belarus‘ autocratic president on Wednesday that he is at risk of being overthrown by his own people if they follow the example of protesters in Tunisia and Egypt.
“Soon a jet plane will have to be kept on standby in Minsk,” Radek Sikorski said, referring to the capital of Belarus.
Sikorski spoke at an international donors conference in Warsaw where governments were pledging money and other forms of support for the democratic opposition in Belarus, which faces censorship and the constant threat of arrest under President Alexander Lukashenko.
The foreign minister pledged Europe’s continuing support to the people of Belarus and said he had a clear message for Lukashenko.
“You are losing,” he said. “Sooner or later you will have to flee your own country, your own people.”
“The people in Belarus have the right to have a reasonable government,” Sikorski said at the conference, which was attended by about 200 representatives from the United States, Canada, European governments and pro-democracy groups.
Lukashenko, often called “Europe’s last dictator,” has ruled the nation of 10 million with an iron hand for more than 16 years. He has kept industry under Soviet-style state control and suppressed opposition with police raids and pressure, but his fiery populism and efforts to maintain a Soviet-style social safety net have kept him popular with the working class and the elderly.
