On Friday, five university students were arrested in the building of Minsk State Linguistic Institute by Belarusian police, according to human rights activists.
Several days ago, the Minsk Linguistic Institute had reportedly warned students about calling the police if they didn’t stop the protests against last month’s results of the re-election of President Alexander Lukashenko.
On September 1st, the first day of the academic year, thousands of students took out protests across Belarus against Lukashenko’s Aug. 9 election win, which many allege was rigged.
Social media videos displayed the chaotic scenes of the students being detained and dragged away by officers.
According to an interior ministry spokeswoman, the arrests were an “administrative process”.
Later on Friday, according to Belarusian media outlets, the five students were released and were charged with taking part in ‘illegal protests’.
Moreover, a court in Minsk imprisoned six journalists detained at the Sept. 1 student protest according to the Belarusian Association of Journalists. The journalists too were found guilty of taking part in ‘illegal protests’.
After Alexander Lukashenko’s victory in the presidential election marked his long time rule of over 25 years there have been massive continuous violent clashes by the protesters.
Protests accused Lukashenko of swindling votes and his 2020 elections opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanouskaya’s campaign rallies drew some of the biggest crowds since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991.