Lukashenko wins Belarus election with 80.23% of the vote

Incumbent President Alexander Lukashenko has won the 2020 election in Belarus with 80,23% of the vote, according to preliminary results cited by the Central Election Commission Monday.

The voter turnout was 84,23%, the results of the election are considered "valid", head of the Central Election Commission Lidia Ermoshina said.

Opposition candidate Svetlana Tikhanovskaya has come in second with 9.90%. The other three candidates received fewer than 2% of the vote: Anna Kanopatskaya got 1.68%, Sergei Cherechen - 1.13%, and Andrei Dmitriev - 1.04%. Meanwhile, 6.02% have voted against all candidates. Yermoshina noted that the preliminary results would be expanded on, however, the final results are unlikely to change significantly.

Yermoshina also informed that the publication of the preliminary results had been postponed, as the employees of the Belarusian Election Commission were evacuated from the government building at about 01:00 am due to mass protests in Minsk, TASS reported.

Protests erupted after the polling stations closed in most cities, including in the capital Minsk, escalating into clashes with the police. 

One person was killed during protests in Minsk last night, representative of the Viasna human rights center Valentin Stefanovich said. "Yes, there is information of one casualty. This happened as a result of special transport colliding with the participants of the protest. Three people were seriously injured, one died as a result of head injury," he said. TASS has no official information from Belarusian law enforcement on the deceased.

The presidential election was held in Belarus on August 9.  Early voting began on 4 August and ran until 8 August.

Presidential elections in Belarus were well-organized and conducted in accordance with the legislation, Head of the CIS Executive Committee, Executive Secretary of the CIS Sergey Lebedev, head of the observation mission, said on Monday.

"The elections were conducted in an organized way and in accordance with Belarusian legislation," he said.