Exit polls on Sunday showed Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko on track to win a seventh five-year term with 87.6 per cent of the vote in the presidential election, according to an exit poll broadcast on state television.
The electoral commission said turnout was 81.5 per cent in the election, in which 6.9 million people were eligible to vote.
Mr Lukashenko – a 70-year-old former collective farm boss – has been in power in reclusive, Moscow-allied Belarus since 1994.
The US and the EU said in the run-up to the election that it could not be free and fair because independent media was banned in Belarus and all leading opposition figures had been jailed or forced to flee abroad. Candidates picked to run against Mr Lukashenko had campaigned in favour of him.
The Moscow ally said he did not care if the EU recognised the vote or not, and said he had "no regrets" over letting his "older brother" Vladimir Putin invade Ukraine through Belarus in 2022 – despite hundreds of thousands of deaths in the three-year war.
Mr Lukashenko has presided over a massive crackdown after suppressing giant protests following his contested reelection in 2020.
He said on Sunday that his opponents had "chosen" prison or exile. "If it is prison then it's those who opened their mouths too widely," he added.
In a press conference that lasted four hours and 25 minutes, he said repenting and asking for pardon are preconditions for any prisoner releases, saying his security services were "watching" those who took part in the protests and are free.
The Viasna rights group says Belarus currently has 1,245 political prisoners. "Some chose prison, some exile. We never kicked anyone out," Mr Lukashenko said.
Tens of thousands fled Belarus in 2020 and 2021, mostly to Poland and Lithuania, as the KGB security service launched a crackdown.
At a rally in Warsaw by Belarus exiles, opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya described Mr Lukashenko as a "criminal who has seized power", denouncing the vote as a "farce."
Mr Lukashenko accused imprisoned opposition activist Maria Kolesnikova – who is held in isolation in a prison in Gomel – of "breaking" prison rules.
He said he had given the order for Ms Kolesnikova to be "shown to the people" last November – when photos of her were released in a first sign of life after she had been held incommunicado for more than a year. "She is fine," he said.
Mr Lukashenko dismissed the rally in Warsaw as insignificant.
Most people in the landlocked country have only distant memories of life before Mr Lukashenko, who was 39 when he won the first national election after Belarus gained independence from the Soviet Union.
Criticism of the strongman is banned. Most people AFP spoke to in Minsk and other towns voiced support for him.
In Minsk, 74-year-old Nadezhda Guzhalovskaya said she voted for Mr Lukashenko due to a lack of other options. "Maybe everything here is not perfect, we don't have democracy," admitted Ms Guzhalovskaya.
But Irina Lebedeva said that "thanks to our president there is peace in this country," repeating the government's narrative, which also accuses the 2020 street protest leaders of sowing chaos.
The UN estimates that about 300,000 Belarusians have left the country since 2020 out of a population of nine million. They will not be able to cast ballots, with Belarus having scrapped voting abroad.
In the run-up to the election, the Lukashenko administration pardoned about 200 political prisoners.
But former prisoners told AFP that those released are under the close watch of security services and are unable to lead a normal life.
Nobel Prize winner Ales Bialiatski is among those in prison in Belarus. While Mr Lukashenko once carefully balanced his relations between the EU and Moscow, since 2020 he has become politically and economically reliant on Russia.
Kaja Kallas, the EU's foreign affairs chief, called the election a "sham" in a posting on X on Saturday and said "Lukashenko doesn't have any legitimacy".
Known as "Europe's last dictator" – a nickname he embraces – Mr Lukashenko's Belarus has retained much of the Soviet Union's traditions and infrastructure.
At his press conference on Sunday, he dismissed rumours that he was planning to hand over to one of his three sons. He said his youngest son Nikolai "could not imagine in his worst dream" that he could be president and "none of my sons could".
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Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Analysis
Members of Syria's Alawite minority community face threat in their heartland after one of the deadliest days in country’s recent history. Read more
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Dhadak 2
Director: Shazia Iqbal
Starring: Siddhant Chaturvedi, Triptii Dimri
Rating: 1/5
Email sent to Uber team from chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi
From: Dara
To: Team@
Date: March 25, 2019 at 11:45pm PT
Subj: Accelerating in the Middle East
Five years ago, Uber launched in the Middle East. It was the start of an incredible journey, with millions of riders and drivers finding new ways to move and work in a dynamic region that’s become so important to Uber. Now Pakistan is one of our fastest-growing markets in the world, women are driving with Uber across Saudi Arabia, and we chose Cairo to launch our first Uber Bus product late last year.
Today we are taking the next step in this journey—well, it’s more like a leap, and a big one: in a few minutes, we’ll announce that we’ve agreed to acquire Careem. Importantly, we intend to operate Careem independently, under the leadership of co-founder and current CEO Mudassir Sheikha. I’ve gotten to know both co-founders, Mudassir and Magnus Olsson, and what they have built is truly extraordinary. They are first-class entrepreneurs who share our platform vision and, like us, have launched a wide range of products—from digital payments to food delivery—to serve consumers.
I expect many of you will ask how we arrived at this structure, meaning allowing Careem to maintain an independent brand and operate separately. After careful consideration, we decided that this framework has the advantage of letting us build new products and try new ideas across not one, but two, strong brands, with strong operators within each. Over time, by integrating parts of our networks, we can operate more efficiently, achieve even lower wait times, expand new products like high-capacity vehicles and payments, and quicken the already remarkable pace of innovation in the region.
This acquisition is subject to regulatory approval in various countries, which we don’t expect before Q1 2020. Until then, nothing changes. And since both companies will continue to largely operate separately after the acquisition, very little will change in either teams’ day-to-day operations post-close. Today’s news is a testament to the incredible business our team has worked so hard to build.
It’s a great day for the Middle East, for the region’s thriving tech sector, for Careem, and for Uber.
Uber on,
Dara
The specs
Engine: 2.0-litre 4cyl turbo
Power: 261hp at 5,500rpm
Torque: 405Nm at 1,750-3,500rpm
Transmission: 9-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 6.9L/100km
On sale: Now
Price: From Dh117,059
French business
France has organised a delegation of leading businesses to travel to Syria. The group was led by French shipping giant CMA CGM, which struck a 30-year contract in May with the Syrian government to develop and run Latakia port. Also present were water and waste management company Suez, defence multinational Thales, and Ellipse Group, which is currently looking into rehabilitating Syrian hospitals.
Retail gloom
Online grocer Ocado revealed retail sales fell 5.7 per cen in its first quarter as customers switched back to pre-pandemic shopping patterns.
It was a tough comparison from a year earlier, when the UK was in lockdown, but on a two-year basis its retail division, a joint venture with Marks&Spencer, rose 31.7 per cent over the quarter.
The group added that a 15 per cent drop in customer basket size offset an 11.6. per cent rise in the number of customer transactions.
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Jetour T1 specs
Engine: 2-litre turbocharged
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Available: Now
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The biog
Hometown: Birchgrove, Sydney Australia
Age: 59
Favourite TV series: Outlander Netflix series
Favourite place in the UAE: Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque / desert / Louvre Abu Dhabi
Favourite book: Father of our Nation: Collected Quotes of Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan
Thing you will miss most about the UAE: My friends and family, Formula 1, having Friday's off, desert adventures, and Arabic culture and people
More on Palestine-Israeli relations
UPI facts
More than 2.2 million Indian tourists arrived in UAE in 2023
More than 3.5 million Indians reside in UAE
Indian tourists can make purchases in UAE using rupee accounts in India through QR-code-based UPI real-time payment systems
Indian residents in UAE can use their non-resident NRO and NRE accounts held in Indian banks linked to a UAE mobile number for UPI transactions
Straightforward ways to reduce sugar in your family's diet
- Ban fruit juice and sodas
- Eat a hearty breakfast that contains fats and wholegrains, such as peanut butter on multigrain toast or full-fat plain yoghurt with whole fruit and nuts, to avoid the need for a 10am snack
- Give young children plain yoghurt with whole fruits mashed into it
- Reduce the number of cakes, biscuits and sweets. Reserve them for a treat
- Don’t eat dessert every day
- Make your own smoothies. Always use the whole fruit to maintain the benefit of its fibre content and don’t add any sweeteners
- Always go for natural whole foods over processed, packaged foods. Ask yourself would your grandmother have eaten it?
- Read food labels if you really do feel the need to buy processed food
- Eat everything in moderation
Silent Hill f
Publisher: Konami
Platforms: PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, PC
Rating: 4.5/5
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
