He will then disband the sitting Parliament, and conduct relatively fair elections to offices which are meaningless. The next Parliament will thus operate under the threat of a quick and easy dissolution. Lukashenka regularly strong-arms the popular opposition. On Conventions, Street Marches, Demonstrations and Picketing in Belarus. The decree generally increases the powers of police and judges in dealing with the opposition.
Police now have the authority, for instance, to impose fines with no judicial oversight.
Ruinous fines ten to twenty times the average monthly salary were imposed on the speaker and vice speakers of Parliament as well as on a number of deputies. Throughout April and May, dozens of protesters, as well as mere passers-by, were detained and imprisoned for as many as ten days. Having administered a collective farm under the old regime, Lukashenka has apparently won the support of the former Soviet aparachniks. The May 23 ratification of the Treaty on the Transformation of the Union of Belarus and Russia, while not providing Lukashenka direct access to the Russian political scene, nevertheless left him the undisputed leader of pro-Soviet circles in Belarus. This charter calls for the two countries to coordinate economic reforms and military activities, create joint energy and transportation systems, and possibly to introduce a common currency.