After police in Belarus violently dispersed protests against election results, arresting thousands, the country’s police minister apologized to ‘random’ people caught up in the violence, but not those he called rioters.
“I offer apologies for the injuries of random people who got caught up in the dispersal,” Interior Minister Yuri Karayev told reporters on Thursday. He noted that rioters have attacked law enforcement 11 times over the past three days.
“We don’t consider the current situation to be a revolution,” Karayev added. He also said he would prioritize the release of journalists that have been jailed in the roundups of demonstrators.
Opposition supporters took to the streets on Sunday, accusing the incumbent President Alexander Lukashenko of election fraud after he announced he had been reelected with 80 percent of the vote.
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