Alexander Lukashenko, who has ruled the ex-Soviet state for 31 years, held a four-hour press conference musing that some of his opponents "chose prison", after winning 88 per cent of the vote.

Belarus’ authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko has extended his more than three decades in power after an orchestrated election that the opposition and the European Union rejected as a sham.The country’s exiled opposition leader called the result “sheer nonsense”.

BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Union rejected the election in Belarus on Sunday as illegitimate and threatened new sanctions. Belarus held an orchestrated vote virtually guaranteed to give 70-year-old autocratic President Alexander Lukashenko yet another term on top of his three decades in power.