After 5 years in jail, opposition determine Tikhanovsky speaks out

[ad_1] Sarah Rainsford Jap and Southern Europe correspondent

<img sizes="(min-width: 1280px) 50vw, (min-width: 1008px) 66vw, 96vw" srcset="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/240/cpsprodpb/4aa4/live/dca05b50-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 240w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/320/cpsprodpb/4aa4/live/dca05b50-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 320w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/4aa4/live/dca05b50-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 480w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/640/cpsprodpb/4aa4/live/dca05b50-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 640w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/4aa4/live/dca05b50-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 800w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/cpsprodpb/4aa4/live/dca05b50-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 1024w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/4aa4/live/dca05b50-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 1536w" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/4aa4/live/dca05b50-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp" loading="eager" alt="EPA Belarusian opposition figure Sergei Tikhanovsky speaks during a rally of Belarusian opposition in front of the Copernicus Monument in Warsaw. He is speaking very animatedly and has his fists clenched. Behind him is a crowd of people." class="sc-d1200759-0 dvfjxj"/> EPA Sergei Tikhanovsky was so emaciated after his launch that even his daughter did not recognise him

Sergei Tikhanovsky has barely spoken for greater than 5 years.

All that point he was held in solitary confinement in a excessive safety Belarusian jail for daring to face as much as a dictator.

Now the previous opposition blogger is free, and phrases stream out of him so rapidly that his ideas typically wrestle to maintain up.

"The restriction on talking was the toughest factor," Sergei confided once we met in Vilnius very quickly after his shock launch.

"When you'll be able to't say or write something, you'll be able to't speak to anybody and also you're simply trapped in a cell – that is the hardest factor – not the restriction on motion."

Sergei is now in enforced exile, freed together with 13 different political prisoners after a senior US delegation paid a uncommon go to to the authoritarian ruler of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko.

After I ask concerning the reunion together with his household, Sergei lifts a hand to his face and weeps.

His daughter was solely 4 when he was arrested.

"She did not recognise me," he manages ultimately, after a protracted pause. "Then she threw herself into my arms and we hugged for a very long time."

Sergei's transformation since his arrest is stunning.

Again in 2020 he was stocky and bearded. Now the face beneath his close-shaven head is gaunt. He says he is misplaced nearly 60kg (132 kilos) in jail, the place he spent limitless weeks in punishment cells.

"Bodily I am half the dimensions and half the burden," Sergei says. "However my spirit will not be damaged. Perhaps it is even stronger."

"Earlier than I would solely heard of the crimes of this regime, however now I've seen them first-hand and we now have to combat that."

Watch: Belarusian opposition determine Sergei Tikhanovsky speaks to the BBC's Sarah Rainsford

Till final week, Sergei Tikhanovsky was some of the distinguished political prisoners in Belarus.

Forward of the 2020 presidential election he developed an enormous YouTube following by filming candid interviews about folks's complaints and issues.

Then he tried to register to run himself, waving an enormous slipper and calling on Belarusians to "Cease the Cockroach!".

"I used to be utilizing the possibility to indicate that it is unattainable to win democratically in Belarus," Sergei explains. "I wished to indicate that the elections are pretend, they usually arrested me."

When his spouse, Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, went on to run in his place she attracted big crowds. After Lukashenko claimed one other implausible victory, these crowds turned a mass protest which quickly turned mass arrests.

<img sizes="(min-width: 1280px) 50vw, (min-width: 1008px) 66vw, 96vw" srcset="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/240/cpsprodpb/8991/live/862401a0-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 240w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/320/cpsprodpb/8991/live/862401a0-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 320w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/8991/live/862401a0-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 480w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/640/cpsprodpb/8991/live/862401a0-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 640w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/8991/live/862401a0-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 800w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/cpsprodpb/8991/live/862401a0-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 1024w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/8991/live/862401a0-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 1536w" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/8991/live/862401a0-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp" loading="lazy" alt="EPA Sergei Tikhanovsky and his wife, Belarusian opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, look at each other smiling. She is holding a bouquet of red and white flowers and he is holding his hand to his heart. " class="sc-d1200759-0 dvfjxj"/> EPA After Sergei Tikhanovsky was imprisoned, his spouse Svetlana Tikhanovskaya ran for the presidency in 2020

In jail, Sergei was consistently singled out for ailing therapy like the opposite high-profile figures – "those they suppose are most harmful, or who they need to destroy", as he places it.

"For the final two-and-a-half years I used to be in whole isolation. I did not get a single letter in nearly three years. For nearly three years they did not let me have any telephone calls," he says.

He wasn't even allowed to see a priest.

"They'd say: you'll die in jail. We're going to maintain extending your time and you will not get out."

To make issues worse, Sergei was incessantly despatched to a punishment cell - for a mark on the wall or a stray cobweb.

"These cells could possibly be three-by-two metres, together with a gap within the flooring for a bathroom," he recollects. "No mattress, no sheet and no pillows."

He would rise up each hour by means of the night time to maintain heat with units of squats and sit-ups, then lie on the wood bunk till his legs and arms seized up, and he needed to begin the workouts another time.

To manage, he needed to empty his mind of all ideas of household and pals.

"You need to put that to at least one aspect," he says. "As a result of if you concentrate on how they're and what's occurring to them, you will not survive."

It was final August when Sergei began to suppose he could be getting out.

That is when the deputy prosecutor started touring prisons and "significantly recommending" that political detainees "write to the dictator and request his pardon" as Sergei places it.

Lukashenko was all of the sudden eager on trying merciful and several other dozen have been launched.

Sergei and the opposite large names, like Viktor Babaryka and Maria Kolesnikova, have been by no means on any lists.

However he by no means entertained the thought of confessing, even to get again to his kids.

"I'm no prison," he explains. "So that might be a betrayal of all who help me."

Then final week the US stepped in.

When particular envoy Keith Kellogg travelled to Minsk to intercede for Americans in jail, he emerged with Sergei, too.

For Lukashenko, the assembly with Kellogg was an enormous win diplomatically.

He has been ostracised by Western nations since he suppressed the peaceable protests in 2020.

His energetic help for Russia in invading Ukraine has remoted him nonetheless additional.

"Now Lukashenko may present some co-operation was beginning, a dialogue with the US," Sergei says, explaining what Lukashenko obtained for releasing some prisoners.

"That was the value: the beginning of contact with him. As a result of no-one had been partaking."

<img sizes="(min-width: 1280px) 50vw, (min-width: 1008px) 66vw, 96vw" srcset="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/240/cpsprodpb/9976/live/dfbab220-5357-11f0-a2ff-17a82c2e8bc4.jpg.webp 240w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/320/cpsprodpb/9976/live/dfbab220-5357-11f0-a2ff-17a82c2e8bc4.jpg.webp 320w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/9976/live/dfbab220-5357-11f0-a2ff-17a82c2e8bc4.jpg.webp 480w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/640/cpsprodpb/9976/live/dfbab220-5357-11f0-a2ff-17a82c2e8bc4.jpg.webp 640w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/9976/live/dfbab220-5357-11f0-a2ff-17a82c2e8bc4.jpg.webp 800w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/cpsprodpb/9976/live/dfbab220-5357-11f0-a2ff-17a82c2e8bc4.jpg.webp 1024w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/9976/live/dfbab220-5357-11f0-a2ff-17a82c2e8bc4.jpg.webp 1536w" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/9976/live/dfbab220-5357-11f0-a2ff-17a82c2e8bc4.jpg.webp" loading="lazy" alt="Getty Images & RFE/RL Four opposition figures still in jail (L-R): Maria Kolesnikova, Viktor Babaryko, Igor Losik and Ales Bialiatski" class="sc-d1200759-0 dvfjxj"/> Getty Photos & RFE/RL (From L-R) Outstanding dissidents Maria Kolesnikova, Viktor Babaryko, Igor Losik and Ales Bialiatski all stay behind bars in Belarus

Sergei needs nothing greater than for all the opposite political prisoners to be launched, too. There are greater than 1,000 in whole.

In tears, he describes assembly an "previous man" just lately who turned out to be a younger good friend, aged past recognition by jail.

"I would give something to get all of them out," Sergei says. "I feel we should always pay any worth. However I do not need them to drop all sanctions."

Sergei's spouse, now the chief of the opposition, is overjoyed to have him again along with her and their kids. However Svetlana tells me she is cautious of the subsequent US transfer.

"We can't soften the sanctions till repressions totally cease," she argues. "For 14 folks launched, 28 extra have been detained instantly in Belarus. For Lukashenko, there isn't a change in coverage."

Sergei's first week of freedom has handed in a whirl of exercise. He has met politicians, made speeches and written to Donald Trump together with his thanks. He has additionally been catching up on misplaced time together with his kids – in addition to all of the information he has missed in isolation.

However what about his ambitions? The final time he and Svetlana have been collectively she was a housewife and he was the political one. So may there be tensions?

"I haven't got any claims to her position," Sergei insists. "I do not want that. I simply want a democratic Belarus."

<img sizes="(min-width: 1280px) 50vw, (min-width: 1008px) 66vw, 96vw" srcset="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/240/cpsprodpb/c995/live/f133fef0-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 240w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/320/cpsprodpb/c995/live/f133fef0-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 320w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/c995/live/f133fef0-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 480w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/640/cpsprodpb/c995/live/f133fef0-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 640w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/c995/live/f133fef0-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 800w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1024/cpsprodpb/c995/live/f133fef0-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 1024w,https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/c995/live/f133fef0-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp 1536w" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/480/cpsprodpb/c995/live/f133fef0-536e-11f0-b1e2-3399ba55c072.jpg.webp" loading="lazy" alt="EPA Supporters of the Belarusian opposition making peace signs in the air. They are wearing white hooded jumpers and red masks disguising their appearance. Red and white are the colours of the opposition. " class="sc-d1200759-0 dvfjxj"/> EPA The white and crimson historic flag of Belarus is utilized by the Belarusian opposition