MINSK, August 27. /TASS/. Belarusian authorities must take the ongoing street protests into account, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in his interview for Rossiya-24 TV Channel Wednesday.
"We believe that all participants of this process [the crisis in Belarus] will have enough common sense to find a way out calmly, without extremities," Putin said. "Of course, if people have taken to the streets, one must take it into account, listen to them, react."
The Russian president pointed out that his Belarusian counterpart Alexander Lukashenko expressed readiness to look into adoption of a new Constitution, which may provide for new parliamentary and presidential elections.
"The Belarusian president, he did say that he is ready to look into an option to hold a constitutional reform, to adopt a new Constitution, to hold new elections, […] based on this new Constitution, but one cannot go beyond the boundaries of the existing Constitution," Putin said. "Have you noticed that the Belarusian Constitutional Court ruled that creation of some super-constitutional bodies, not provided for by the basic law, seeking to seize power, is totally unacceptable? And this is hard to disagree with."
Earlier, Lukashenko proposed to amend the Constitution in a bid to redistribute the authority of different levels of power and to relegate a portion of powers "down." He also proposed to write down obligatory military service as a prerequisite for a presidential candidate. According to Lukashenko, the new Constitution must be adopted via a referendum. New elections are only possible after a new Constitution is adopted, he said.
The presidential election in Belarus took place on August 9. According to the Central Election Commission, incumbent president Alexander Lukashenko won 80.1% of the vote. Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, who was considered his main opponent, ended up second with 10.12% of the ballot. She refused to recognize the election results and left Belarus for the neighboring Lithuania shortly, where she remains to this day. Immediately after exit poll results were announced, mass protests erupted in the country, which were initially accompanied by clashes between protesters and law enforcement forces. The Coordination Council of the opposition created in the republic urges people to continue the protests. The authorities state that unauthorized rallies must be stopped.