Belarus 'farce' elections condemned
Protests were reported in Minsk
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Monday, 29, Sep 2008 09:23
Belarus' opposition parties failed to win a single seat in its parliamentary elections yesterday, results suggest.
With 11 of the 110 seats up for election yet to be announced the opposition had not won representation at the national level.
Turnout was around 75 per cent in the east European state. The poll had been seen as a key test of whether Belarus would be recognised by the international community.
"It will be difficult for any of you of the western observers not to recognise it," president Alexander Lukashenko, casting his vote in yesterday's elections, was quoted by the Reuters news agency as saying.
"We are holding the elections for ourselves."
Electoral Commission head Lidia Yermoshina suggested the fear of mass demonstrations and discomfort with radical changes led to the results.
But around 800 protestors gathered in Oktyabrskaya Square in Minsk, Reuters reported, waving European Union and orange flags to challenge what they described as a "farce" of a vote.
Mr Lukashenko has been vilified by the west. He was described by US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice as the "last dictator" of Europe.
The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which sent a team of international observers to Belarus for the elections, will issue its judgment later today.