The President of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, has stated that he will not run for another, eighth term in office.
Aleksandar Grigorievich Lukashenko (70), who began his seventh five-year presidential term at the beginning of this year, is the first and so far the only president of Belarus since the introduction of that office in 1994, which makes him the longest serving leader in Europe.
“No, I’m not making any plans for now. I’m not planning anything. The only thing I thought, and I never said, is that, well, (President of the United States Donald) Trump is almost 80 years old and still looks decent,” he said in an interview with the American magazine Time, reported by the Belarusian news agency Belta.
He expressed the hope that his successor will continue the development of the country and answered the question of whether he sees his son Nikolaj in that place.
“No, he is not the successor. I knew you would ask that. No, no, no! You could really offend him by nominating him,” he said.
Lukashenko suggested that the next president of Belarus might pursue a slightly different policy.
“I would just like them not to tear everything down, but to continue as I did: leaning on the shoulders of the strong, building on what already exists, gradually developing the country without a destructive revolutionary upheaval. That is what I want. If they convince society that it needs a different direction, well, so be it,” Lukashenko said.
Lukashenko has been called “Europe’s last dictator” in the West.
A close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, he doesn’t mind being called a ruthless autocrat, and three years ago he declared in parliament: “I am a dictator, I find it hard to understand democracy.”
