MINSK, August 11. /TASS/. Belarusian opposition presidential candidate Svetlana Tikhanovskaya’s decision to leave the republic has come as a surprise to her team, Olga Kovalkova, a member of Tikhanovskaya’s election campaign, said during Tuesday’s press conference.
"Before her visit to the Central Election Commission, Tikhanovskaya was not planning to leave Belarus, she could have made this decision under pressure," Kovalkova said. "This decision came as a surprise to us; before her visit to the Central Election Commission, she wasn’t planning on making it."
"Perhaps, she was forced to do that," Kovalkova repeated. She noted that Tikhanovskaya’s team would hold a meeting on Tuesday to discuss its further plan of action.
It was reported earlier that Tikhanovskaya had left Belarus for Lithuania. In a video address published on Tuesday, she called on her supporters to not go out on the streets and to respect the Belarusian law. She added that she had made the decision to leave Belarus on her own.
Belarus held a presidential election on August 9. According to the preliminary results provided by the Belarusian Central Election Committee, incumbent President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko got 80.08% of the vote. Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, who was considered his main opponent, came in second with 10.09%. She stated that she didn’t recognize these results, considering herself the elected head of state, and filed a complaint with the Central Election Committee. After exit poll results were announced in the evening of August 9, protests erupted in downtown Minsk and other regions of the country, leading to clashes between protesters and law enforcement forces. As a result, according to the republic’s Interior Ministry, about 3,000 people were detained, dozens of police officers and protesters were injured.