"text":"After seven decades as a constituent republic of the USSR, Belarus attained its independence in 1991. It has retained closer political and economic ties to Russia than have any of the other former Soviet republics, and since 2022 Belarus has facilitated Russia's war in Ukraine, which was launched in part from Belarusian territory. Belarus and Russia signed a treaty on a two-state union on 8 December 1999 envisioning greater political and economic integration. Although Belarus agreed to a framework to carry out the accord, serious implementation has yet to take place and negotiations on further integration have been contentious. Since his election in July 1994 as the country's first and only directly elected president, Alyaksandr LUKASHENKA has steadily consolidated his power through authoritarian means and a centralized economic system. Government restrictions on political and civil freedoms, freedom of speech and the press, peaceful assembly, and religion have remained in place. Restrictions on political freedoms have grown increasingly strained following the disputed presidential election in August 2020. The election results sparked largescale protests as members of the opposition and civil society criticized the election’s validity. Alyaksandr LUKASHENKA has remained in power as the disputed winner of the presidential election after quelling protests in late 2020. <p></p> <p></p> <p></p> <p></p>"
"text":"Dnieper (shared with Russia [s] and Ukraine [m]) - 2,287 km<br><strong>note</strong> – [s] after country name indicates river source; [m] after country name indicates river mouth"
"text":"<br>Книга фактов о мире – незаменимый источник базовой информации. (Russian)<br><br>The World Factbook, the indispensable source for basic information."
"text":"soil pollution from pesticide use; southern part of the country contaminated with fallout from 1986 nuclear reactor accident at Chornobyl' in northern Ukraine"
},
"Environment - international agreements":{
"party to":{
"text":"Air Pollution, Air Pollution-Nitrogen Oxides, Air Pollution-Sulphur 85, Antarctic-Environmental Protection, Antarctic Treaty, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Climate Change-Kyoto Protocol, Climate Change-Paris Agreement, Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban, Desertification, Endangered Species, Environmental Modification, Hazardous Wastes, Law of the Sea, Marine Dumping-London Convention, Nuclear Test Ban, Ozone Layer Protection, Ship Pollution, Wetlands"
},
"signed, but not ratified":{
"text":"none of the selected agreements"
}
},
"Climate":{
"text":"cold winters, cool and moist summers; transitional between continental and maritime"
"text":"Dnieper (shared with Russia [s] and Ukraine [m]) - 2,287 km<br><strong>note</strong> – [s] after country name indicates river source; [m] after country name indicates river mouth"
"text":"the name is a compound of the Belarusian words \"bel\" (white) and \"Rus\" (the Old East Slavic ethnic designation) to form the meaning White Rusian or White Ruthenian"
}
},
"Government type":{
"text":"presidential republic in name, although in fact a dictatorship"
},
"Capital":{
"name":{
"text":"Minsk"
},
"geographic coordinates":{
"text":"53 54 N, 27 34 E"
},
"time difference":{
"text":"UTC+2 (7 hours ahead of Washington, DC, during Standard Time)"
"text":"the origin of the name is disputed; Minsk may originally have been located 16 km to the southwest, on the banks of Menka River; remnants of a 10th-century settlement on the banks of the Menka have been found"
"note":"<strong>note:</strong> administrative divisions have the same names as their administrative centers; Russian spelling provided for reference when different from Belarusian"
"text":"Independence Day, 3 July (1944); note - 3 July 1944 was the date Minsk was liberated from German troops, 25 August 1991 was the date of independence from the Soviet Union"
},
"Constitution":{
"history":{
"text":"several previous; latest drafted between late 1991 and early 1994, signed 15 March 1994"
"text":"proposed by the president of the republic through petition to the National Assembly or by petition of least 150,000 eligible voters; approval required by at least two-thirds majority vote in both chambers or by simple majority of votes cast in a referendum; amended 1996, 2004"
"text":"civil law system; note - nearly all major codes (civil, civil procedure, criminal, criminal procedure, family, and labor) were revised and came into force in 1999 and 2000"
},
"International law organization participation":{
"text":"has not submitted an ICJ jurisdiction declaration; non-party state to the ICCt"
},
"Citizenship":{
"citizenship by birth":{
"text":"no"
},
"citizenship by descent only":{
"text":"at least one parent must be a citizen of Belarus"
"text":"Prime Minister Roman GOLOVCHENKO (since 4 June 2020); First Deputy Prime Minister Mikalay SNAPKOW (since 4 June 2020); Deputy Prime Ministers Ihar PETRYSHENKA (since 18 August 2018), Anatol SIVAK (since 1 September 2020), Leanid ZAYATS (since 21 March 2022), Petr PARKHOMCHYK (since 16 August 2022)"
"text":"president directly elected by absolute majority popular vote in 2 rounds if needed for a 5-year term (no term limits); first election held on 23 June and 10 July 1994; according to the 1994 constitution, the next election should have been held in 1999; however, Alyaksandr LUKASHENKA extended his term to 2001 via a November 1996 referendum; subsequent election held on 9 September 2001; an October 2004 referendum ended presidential term limits and allowed the President LUKASHENKA to run and win a third term (19 March 2006); a fourth term (19 December 2010); a fifth term (11 October 2015); a sixth term (9 August 2020); next election to be held in 2025; prime minister and deputy prime ministers appointed by the president and approved by the National Assembly"
"text":"<em><br>9 August 2020:</em> Alyaksandr LUKASHENKA reelected president (); percent of vote - Alyaksandr LUKASHENKA (independent) 80.1%, Svyatlana TSIKHANOWSKAYA (independent) 10.1%, other 9.8%; note - widespread street protests erupted following announcement of the election results amid allegations of voter fraud<br><em><br>11 October 2015:</em> Alyaksandr LUKASHENKA president (); percent of vote - Alyaksandr LUKASHENKA (independent) 84.1%, Tatsyana KARATKEVICH 4.4%, Sergey GAYDUKEVICH 3.3%, other 8.2%."
"text":"bicameral National Assembly or Natsyyalny Skhod consists of:<br>Council of the Republic or Savet Respubliki (64 seats; 56 members indirectly elected by regional and Minsk city councils and 8 members appointed by the president; members serve 4-year terms)<br>House of Representatives or Palata Pradstawnikow (110 seats; members directly elected in single-seat constituencies by absolute majority vote in 2 rounds if needed; members serve 4-year terms)"
"text":"<br>Council of the Republic - indirect election last held on 7 November 2019<br>House of Representatives - last held on 17 November 2019 (next to be held on 25 February 2024); OSCE observers determined that the election was neither free nor impartial and that vote counting was problematic in a number of polling stations; pro-LUKASHENKA candidates won every seat; international observers determined that the previous elections, on 28 September 2008, 23 September 2012, and 11 September 2016 also fell short of democratic standards, with pro-LUKASHENKA candidates winning every, or virtually every, seat"
"text":"<br>Council of the Republic - percent of vote by party - NA; seats by party - NA; composition - NA<br>House of Representatives - percent of vote by party - NA; seats by party - KPB 11, Republican Party of Labor and Justice 6, BPP 2, LDP 1, BAP 1, independent 89; composition - men 66, women 44, percent of women 40%"
"text":"Supreme Court (consists of the chairman and deputy chairman and organized into several specialized panels, including economic and military; number of judges set by the president of the republic and the court chairman); Constitutional Court (consists of 12 judges, including a chairman and deputy chairman)"
},
"judge selection and term of office":{
"text":"Supreme Court judges appointed by the president with the consent of the Council of the Republic; judges initially appointed for 5 years and evaluated for life appointment; Constitutional Court judges - 6 appointed by the president and 6 elected by the Council of the Republic; the presiding judge directly elected by the president and approved by the Council of the Republic; judges can serve for 11 years with an age limit of 70"
},
"subordinate courts":{
"text":"oblast courts; Minsk City Court; town courts; Minsk city and oblast economic courts"
"text":"<strong>pro-government parties:</strong><br>Belarusian Agrarian Party or BAP [Mikhail RUSY]<br>Belarusian Patriotic Party or BPP [Mikalay ULAKHOVICH]<br>Belarusian Social Sport Party or BSSP [Uladzimir ALEKSANDROVICH]<br>Belaya Rus [Henadz DAVYDKA]<br>Communist Party of Belarus or KPB [Alyaksey SOKOL]<br>Liberal Democratic Party or LDP [Aleh GAYDUKEVICH]<br>Republican Party [Uladzimir BELAZOR]<br>Republican Party of Labor and Justice [Alyaksandr STSYAPANAW]<br>Social Democratic Party of Popular Accord [Syarhey YERMAK]<br><strong>opposition parties:</strong> <br>Belarusian Christian Democracy Party [Paval SEVYARYNETS, Volha KAVALKOVA, Vital RYMASHEWSKI] (unregistered)<br>Belarusian Party of the Green [Dzimtry KUCHUK]<br>Belarusian Party of the Left \"Just World\" [Syarhey KALYAKIN]<br>Belarusian Social-Democratic Assembly of BSDH [Syarhey CHERACHEN]<br>Belarusian Social Democratic Party (\"Assembly\") or BSDPH [Ihar BARYSAW]<br>Belarusian Social Democratic Party (People's Assembly) or BSDP [Mikalay STATKEVICH] (unregistered)<br>BPF Party [Ryhor KASTUSYOW]<br>Christian Conservative Party-BPF [Zyanon PAZNYAK]<br>United Civic Party or UCP [Mikalay KAZLOW]"
"text":"red horizontal band (top) and green horizontal band one-half the width of the red band; a white vertical stripe on the hoist side bears Belarusian national ornamentation in red; the red band color recalls past struggles from oppression, the green band represents hope and the many forests of the country"
},
"National symbol(s)":{
"text":"no clearly defined current national symbol, the mounted knight known as Pahonia (the Chaser) is the traditional Belarusian symbol; national colors: green, red, white"
},
"National anthem":{
"name":{
"text":"\"My, Bielarusy\" (We Belarusians)"
},
"lyrics/music":{
"text":"Mikhas KLIMKOVICH and Uladzimir KARYZNA/Nester SAKALOUSKI"
"note":"<strong>note:</strong> music adopted 1955, lyrics adopted 2002; after the fall of the Soviet Union, Belarus kept the music of its Soviet-era anthem but adopted new lyrics; also known as \"Dziarzauny himn Respubliki Bielarus\" (State Anthem of the Republic of Belarus)"
"text":"declining Russian energy subsidies will end in 2024; growing public debt; strong currency pressures have led to higher inflation; recent price controls on basic food and drugs; public sector wage increases and fragile private sector threaten household income gains and economic growth"
"text":"the Government of Belarus has successfully promoted the migration to an all-IP platform as part of a wider effort towards a digital transformation for the economy; the state-supported infrastructure operator beCloud has built an extensive fiber network, which reaches all but the smallest settlements in the country; Belarus has the second-highest fiber subscription rate in Europe, behind only Iceland; LTE coverage is almost universal, while considerable progress has also been made in developing 5G services (2021)"
"text":"fixed-line teledensity is improving although rural areas continue to be underserved, approximately 45 per 100 fixed-line; mobile-cellular teledensity now roughly 123 telephones per 100 persons (2021)"
"text":"country code - 375; Belarus is landlocked and therefore a member of the Trans-European Line (TEL), Trans-Asia-Europe (TAE) fiber-optic line, and has access to the Trans-Siberia Line (TSL); 3 fiber-optic segments provide connectivity to Latvia, Poland, Russia, and Ukraine; worldwide service is available to Belarus through this infrastructure; additional analog lines to Russia; Intelsat, Eutelsat, and Intersputnik earth stations; almost 31,000 base stations in service in 2019 (2020)"
"text":"7 state-controlled national TV channels; Polish and Russian TV broadcasts are available in some areas; state-run Belarusian Radio operates 5 national networks and an external service; Russian and Polish radio broadcasts are available (2019)"
"note":"<strong>note:</strong> paved runways have a concrete or asphalt surface but not all have facilities for refueling, maintenance, or air traffic control; the length of a runway required for aircraft to safely operate depends on a number of factors including the type of aircraft, the takeoff weight (including passengers, cargo, and fuel), engine types, flap settings, landing speed, elevation of the airport, and average maximum daily air temperature; paved runways can reach a length of 5,000 m (16,000 ft.), but the “typical” length of a commercial airline runway is between 2,500-4,000 m (8,000-13,000 ft.)"
"note":"<strong>note:</strong> unpaved runways have a surface composition such as grass or packed earth and are most suited to the operation of light aircraft; unpaved runways are usually short, often less than 1,000 m (3,280 ft.) in length; airports with unpaved runways often lack facilities for refueling, maintenance, or air traffic control"
"text":"2,500 km (2011) (major rivers are the west-flowing Western Dvina and Neman Rivers and the south-flowing Dnepr River and its tributaries, the Berezina, Sozh, and Pripyat Rivers)"
"text":"Belarus Armed Forces: Army, Air and Air Defense Force, Special Operations Force, Special Troops (electronic warfare, signals, engineers, biological/chemical/nuclear protection troops, etc)<br><br>Ministry of Interior: State Border Troops, Militia, Internal Troops (2023)",
"note":"<strong>note:</strong> in early 2023, President LUKASHENKO ordered the formation of a new volunteer paramilitary territorial defense force to supplement the Army"
"text":"approximately 45,000 active duty troops; information on the individual services varies, but reportedly includes about 25,000 Army, 15,000 Air/Air Defense, and 5,000 Special Operations forces (2022)"
"text":"the military's inventory is comprised mostly of Russian/Soviet-origin equipment, and in recent years Russia has continued to be the leading provider of arms; Belarus's defense industry manufactures some equipment (mostly modernized Soviet designs), including vehicles, guided weapons, and electronic warfare systems (2023)"
"text":"18-27 years of age for compulsory military or alternative service; conscript service obligation is 12-18 months, depending on academic qualifications, and 24-36 months for alternative service, also depending on academic qualifications; 17-year-olds are eligible to become cadets at military higher education institutes, where they are classified as military personnel (2023)",
"note":"<strong>note:</strong> conscripts can be assigned to the military, to the Ministry of Interior as internal or border troops, or to the Ministry of Labor and Social Protection (alternative service); as of 2020, conscripts comprised an estimated 40% of the military"
"text":"Belarus has close security ties with Russia, including an integrated air and missile defense system, joint training exercises, and the establishment of three joint training centers since 2020 (1 in Belarus, 2 in Russia); Russia has been the principal supplier of arms to Belarus, and Belarusian troops reportedly train on Russian equipment; Russia leases from Belarus a strategic ballistic missile defense site operated by Russian Aerospace Forces and a global communications facility for the Russian Navy; in 2020, the countries signed an agreement allowing for close security cooperation between the Belarusian Ministry of Interior and the Russian National Guard, including protecting public order and key government facilities, and combating extremism and terrorism; in 2022, Belarus allowed Russian military forces to stage on its territory for its invasion of Ukraine and continues to supply arms and other aid to the Russian military; in 2023, Belarus agreed to allow Russia to deploy nuclear munitions inside the country<br><br>Belarus has been a member of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) since 1994 and contributes an airborne brigade to CSTO's rapid reaction force (KSOR) (2023)"
"text":"<p><em>Belarus-Latvia:</em> Boundary demarcated with Latvia.<br><br><em>Belarus-Lithuania:</em> Boundary demarcated with Lithuania.<br><br><em>Belarus-Poland:</em> As a member state that forms part of the EU's external border, Poland has implemented strict Schengen border rules to restrict illegal immigration and trade along its border with Belarus.</p>"
"text":"Tier 3 — Belarus does not fully meet the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking and is not making significant efforts to do so, therefore Belarus was downgraded to Tier 3; nonetheless, the government took some steps to address trafficking, including conducting investigations and prosecutions and identifying and referring victims to services; however, the government did not report investigating, prosecuting, or convicting traffickers under its trafficking statute nor provide adequate protection to victims; officials reportedly returned many migrants and asylum seekers to their countries of origin without comprehensively screening them for trafficking; the government did not report conducting awareness activities, and its efforts to prevent labor trafficking remained inadequate; for the 5th consecutive year, Belarus did not report investigating or filing charges related to illegal recruitment of migrant workers (2022)"
"text":"human traffickers exploit domestic and foreign victims and exploit Belarusians abroad; the majority of trafficking victims are men subjected to forced labor, primarily in Russia; most Belarusian victims are trafficked in Belarus and Russia, but also in Poland, Turkey, and other European, Eurasian and Middle Eastern countries; some Belarusian women traveling for foreign employment in the adult entertainment and hotel industries are subjected to sex trafficking; most traffickers are Belarusian citizens, and traffickers increasingly use online methods to coerce victims into forced labor and sex trafficking (2022)"
"text":"limited cultivation of opium poppy and cannabis, mostly for the domestic market; transshipment point for illicit drugs to and via Russia, and to the Baltics and Western Europe; a small and lightly regulated financial center; anti-money-laundering legislation does not meet international standards and was weakened further when know-your-customer requirements were curtailed in 2008; few investigations or prosecutions of money-laundering activities"
