VILNIUS — French President Emmanuel Macron met with Belarusian opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya on Tuesday morning during a visit to Lithuania.
The meeting was one of the most high-profile demonstrations of support for the Belarusian opposition by a Western leader since the country’s disputed presidential election in August.
The talks at Macron’s hotel in Vilnius lasted a little over half an hour. French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, Europe Minister Clément Beaune and Alexandre Adam, an adviser to Macron on Europe, were also present.
“It was a wonderful meeting, he’s a wonderful person,” Tikhanovskaya said afterward. “He promised us to do everything to help with negotiations in this political crisis in our country. He [said] that time is very crucial because a lot of people are suffering because of this regime, too many people are in jails and he will do everything just to help to release all the political prisoners.”
Macron arrived in Vilnius on Monday to begin a three-day regional visit. Tikhanovskaya fled to Lithuania following the presidential election, in which she stood against autocratic incumbent Alexander Lukashenko.
The EU and other Western powers have refused to recognize the official results of the poll, which gave victory to Lukashenko, due to widespread allegations of electoral fraud. The EU has also condemned the violent repression of anti-Lukashenko protests.
However, the bloc’s efforts to impose sanctions on senior Belarusian officials have been held up by Cyprus, which wants sanctions against Turkey agreed at the same time.
Macron has been discussing the possibility of mediation in Belarus by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) in Europe with Russian President Vladimir Putin since mid-August.
“We will have a policy of pressure through sanctions [on Belarus] and of dialogue with Russia because it is not a result we can get without including President Putin in this phase,” Macron said at a debate with students at the University of Vilnius after the meeting. “We said clearly that it would be an error and an unacceptable provocation for Russia to get involved with military or police forces and that is should remain a Belorussian issue and not an intervention by neighbors.”
Macron said he wants EU sanctions “as soon as possible” and called on Belarusian authorities to end arbitrary arrests, release political prisoners, and respect the real results of the elections. He said he was working with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, European Council President Charles Michel and Lithuanian President Gitanas Nausėda on achieving those goals.
At her meeting with Macron, Tikhanovskaya asked for help in securing OSCE mediation and negotiations with Lukashenko.
“Mr. Macron understands that the situation cannot be solved without Russia, that Russia basically is the main reason why Lukashenko is in power,” Franak Viačorka, an adviser to Tikhanovskaya, said after the meeting.
Tikhanovskaya did not ask Macron to put pressure on Lukashenko, according to Viačorka, but asked him for advice on how to proceed given that he is a “professional politician,” unlike her. “Mr. Macron said there is no one recipe for this,” he added.