The republic takes a rampant

In Belarus - a nationwide strike. The police are trying to make people work. In response, rushes: "Get out - you and your riot police!"

The Belarusian opposition, as promised two weeks ago, began on October 26 a national strike. Since 1994, Alexander Lukashenko, who ruling the country, has not fulfilled any of the conditions of the People’s ultimatum: he did not initiate an investigation into the torture of detained demonstrators, did not release political prisoners and, of course, did not resign. Thousands of people throughout the country in response - did not go to work.

The ammonia and carbamide workshops of the Grod-Azot plant began to be the first to start.

“At 7 in the morning, about 200 people gathered near the entrance,” says Yuri Rovova, chairman of the Stachkom of the enterprise. - Their change was supposed to begin at 8 o’clock, but the workers were not going to accept her. By 7:30, the security forces were pulled to the factory. They began to crowd people for the passing - to the territory of the plant. The detentions began: fifty people were taken to the police department.

The detainees were beaten, they stomped on them. They asked: "What, bitches, do not want to work?"

The striking factories never accepted the shift.

- Now those who have worked the night continue to remain at workplaces. But they have been working for 19 hours, ”said Rovova. “At the same time, the striking refuses to accept the shift in the key workshops of Grod-Azot: in the Ammonia-3 workshop and the nitric acid and carbamide ammic mixtures. These workshops are half the capacities of the enterprise, they process 5% of the republican natural gas. According to my information, the workers of auxiliary workshops are now also thinking of leaving the workshops. But the authorities do not yet give them the opportunity to leave jobs.

Rovova says that Grod-Azot General Director Igor Bobyr and chief engineer Sergei Silonik tried to persuade the workers to accept the shift. Unsuccessfully.

Students of the Grodno State University came to support factory workers. And taxi drivers. Citizens carry protesting pizza and tea.

Minsk workers organized strikes differently.

• A procession was held at the Tractor Plant. Dozens of factory workers went through the workshops by march, chanting "Determine!" ("Join!"). They did not start work.

• At the factory of wheeled tractors, the procession was arranged not on workshops, but through the territory of the enterprise.

• At the Minsk Electrotechnical Plant, a stamping workshop stopped work: the factory workers came to workplaces and began to just communicate with each other.

• At the Belokmunmash, engineers and technologists joined the strike. A significant part of the staff took sick leave and roasts.

The largest action among the Minsk "industrialists" is at the Tractor Plant.

“At 8 in the morning we gathered at the entrance, 150 people,” says one of the participants in the strike. - Then went marching for the workshops. First, by mechanical, then they switched to the press. They shouted to other factory workers to join. And 50 people really joined. At some point, the deputy director of ideology Andrei Suslenkov and the head of the thermal workshop Alexei Kolesnikov appeared. We started asking on what basis we walk around the plant? Well, we actually work here. They were simply ignored.

According to the chairman of the Belarusian Congress of Democratic Trade Unions, Alexander Yaroshuk, strikes at enterprises may expand.

- The response has already been obtained on a more noticeable scale than could be expected. If before this day we assumed that the protests would be local, that people would simply take off, today we see that, for example, at Grod-Azot, we can talk about the stop of production, ”says Yaroshuk. - strikes go at a number of enterprises, where salaries are higher than the national average - at the same MAZ, at Belaruskali, where people receive $ 800-1000 each. And this unequivocally testifies that the protest is not social, but political.

Workers are an integral part of the Belarusian society. And if the authorities are trying to crush the public by force, then they are trying to crush workers.

But factory workers are not the only ones who started a strike on Monday. Hundreds of stores, cafes, hairdressers did not open throughout Belarus: “re -learning”, “weekend”, “change of goods”.

- Four people work in our store. I took a vacation at my own expense, I also sent employees to “unpaid”, but in fact I will pay them, ”one of the entrepreneurs told me. - For me, this is a personal matter: on August 10, my son was injured at the rally - he was beaten with batons. If not for this episode, he would not have closed.

Another form of protest is an extremely slow riding. Even those who went to work resort to it: in social networks, Belarusians say that the electric trains are late for an average of an hour. Drivers in city streets are also “slowing down”: they create traffic jams. True, not always without consequences: in the morning, eyewitnesses filmed on the video as near the Pushkinskaya metro station, the traffic police hit the “too slowly driving” car. The driver has to add speed.

By 12 o’clock, the action of the Minsk students began at the Belarusian State University: it gathered about 400 people who blocked Leningradskaya Street.

- We started to strike at 9 in the morning. We got up from the desk and went to the hall, ”says one of the participants in the action, a student of BSU. - At first they just sat in the lobby, then occupied the corridors of their faculties, urging others to join the strike. Teachers did not interfere. The only faculty that did not take part at all was a military man: they are forbidden.

The student action tried to disperse the police. Without the use of weapons.

Students clasped their hands and chased: "Get out - you and your riot police!" Surprisingly, the security forces really left.

Maybe - for reinforcements, but it was no longer important for students: they retreated to Independence Square, where they joined the procession of the Minsk pensioners.

A separate action was conducted by students and teachers of the Minsk State Linguistic University: they stood in a chain in front of the university building and sang the "Warriors of the Light."

The only ones who cannot directly go up is doctors. Especially in the light of tight suppression of demonstrations. According to unofficial information, when overclocking the procession on October 25, 6 people were injured with rubber bullets and light -Shuman grenades.

But doctors have a different form of protest. In the district chats in Telegram, people write that it was so easy to get sick as now, in Belarus it was never: they give at once for five days, with any malaise.

Be healthy, Belarus!