Portal:Belarus
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Сардэчна запрашаем да беларускага партала!
Belarus, officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Russia to the east and northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Belarus spans an area of 207,600 square kilometres (80,200 sq mi) with a population of 9.1 million. The country has a hemiboreal climate and is administratively divided into six regions. Minsk is the capital and largest city; it is administered separately as a city with special status.
For most of the medieval period, the lands of modern-day Belarus were ruled by independent city-states such as the Principality of Polotsk. Around 1300 these lands came fully under the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and subsequently by the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth; this period lasted for 500 years until the 1792–1795 partitions of Poland-Lithuania placed Belarus within the Russian Empire for the first time. In the aftermath of the Russian Revolution in 1917, different states arose competing for legitimacy amid the Civil War, ultimately ending in the rise of the Byelorussian SSR, which became a founding constituent republic of the Soviet Union in 1922. After the Polish-Soviet War (1918–1921), Belarus lost almost half of its territory to Poland. Much of the borders of Belarus took their modern shape in 1939, when some lands of the Second Polish Republic were reintegrated into it after the Soviet invasion of Poland, and were finalised after World War II. During World War II, military operations devastated Belarus, which lost about a quarter of its population and half of its economic resources. In 1945, the Byelorussian SSR became a founding member of the United Nations, along with the Soviet Union. The republic was home to a widespread and diverse anti-Nazi insurgent movement which dominated politics until well into the 1970s, overseeing Belarus's transformation from an agrarian to an industrial economy.
The parliament of the republic proclaimed the sovereignty of Belarus on 27 July 1990, and during the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Belarus gained independence on 25 August 1991. Following the adoption of a new constitution in 1994, Alexander Lukashenko was elected Belarus's first president in the country's first and only free election after independence, serving as president ever since. Lukashenko heads a highly centralised authoritarian government. Belarus ranks low in international measurements of freedom of the press and civil liberties. It has continued several Soviet-era policies, such as state ownership of large sections of the economy. In 2000, Belarus and Russia signed a treaty for greater cooperation, forming the Union State. (Full article...)
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In August 2021, the government of Belarus began sponsoring an influx of migrants, mostly from the Middle East and North Africa, to the borders of Lithuania, Poland and Latvia. Although Belarus denied involvement, both the European Union and independent observers[who?] viewed it as hybrid warfare undertaken in response to the deterioration in Belarus–European Union relations following the 2020 Belarusian presidential election and the 2020–2021 Belarusian protests. Between August and December 2021, tens of thousands of unauthorized border crossing attempts were recorded, peaking in October. At least 20 migrants died in the following winter due to the harsh weather and abuse from border authorities. Attempted border crossings fell sharply the following year, but never returned to their pre-crisis levels. In the spring of 2024, numbers began rising again, although they remain well below those seen in the peak of the crisis in 2021.
The crisis began sometime around 7 July 2021, when Belarus's president Alexander Lukashenko threatened to "flood" the EU with "drugs and migrants". Belarusian authorities and state-controlled travel agencies, together with some airlines operating in the Middle East, started advertising tours to Belarus and falsely promoting opportunities of easy entry into the European Union. Those who arrived in Belarus, most of whom were trying to reach Germany, were then given instructions about how and where to cross the EU's border, and what to tell the border guards on the other side of it. Migrants said that Belarus provided them with wire cutters and axes to cut through border barriers and enter the EU. However, those who did not manage to cross were often forced to stay on the border by Belarusian authorities, who were accused of assaulting migrants who failed to get across. Belarus has repeatedly refused entry to Polish convoys carrying humanitarian aid for migrants. (Full article...)
Selected biography

Vladimir Yakovlevich Motyl (Russian: Влади́мир Я́ковлевич Моты́ль; 26 June 1927 – 21 February 2010) was a Soviet and Russian film director and screenwriter.
Vladimir Motyl was born in Lepiel, Belarus. His father was a Polish émigré, who was arrested in 1930 and sent to Solovki and died there the following year. Many of his other relatives suffered similar treatment. Vladimir and his mother were exiled to the Northern Urals, where he became fascinated in theatre and cinema, and later graduated from the Sverdlovsk Theatrical Institute. For about 10 years he worked in various theatres in the Urals and Siberia and eventually became chief director of Sverdlovsk Young Spectator's Theatre. (Full article...)
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- ... that German national Rico Krieger was likely forced by the Belarusian KGB to lie in a state-televised plea titled "Confession of a German Terrorist"?
- ... that gay rights activist Sergey Androsenko sued the Belarusian government over his arrest and beating at the 2010 Minsk Pride?
- ... that the Russian and Belarusian military exercise Zapad 2013 was officially described as counterterrorist, but international observers concluded that it was a preparation for a conventional war?
- ... that the Russian and Belarussian military exercise Zapad 2009 involved nuclear-capable ballistic missiles?
- ... that there are more than 9,000 swamps in Belarus?
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- ...that the only remaining instance of active use of the death penalty in Europe is in capital punishment in Belarus?
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Sources
- ↑ Harshav, Benjamin. Marc Chagall and his times: a documentary narrative. Contraversions: Jews and Other Differences. Stanford University Press; 1 edition. August 2003. ISBN 0804742146.
- ↑ Kopka, D. (2011). Welcome to Belarus: Passport to Eastern Europe & Russia. Passport Series. Milliken Publishing Company. p. 6. ISBN 978-0-7877-2770-3. Retrieved July 28, 2019.








