A prominent opposition activist who resisted her forcible expulsion from Belarus by ripping up her passport has accused authorities of threatening to kill her amid their efforts to end a month of protests against the country’s authoritarian president. Ms Kolesnikova is a leading member of the Coordination Council created by opposition activists to push for a new election. She was detained on Monday and destroyed her passport in a no-man’s land between Ukraine and Belarus the next day to prevent her expulsion. Ms Kolesnikova, who remains jailed in Minsk, is accused of undermining national security as part of a criminal probe against senior members of the opposition Coordination Council. All of the council’s senior members except for Nobel Prize-winning writer Svetlana Alexievich have been jailed or forcibly expelled from the country.

Source: Irish Independent September 10, 2020 14:37 UTC