MINSK: Belarus defied Western pressure and called in a key opposition figure for questioning Monday on the anniversary of protests that saw hundreds jailed upon strongman Alexander Lukashenko's re-election.
Nearly 50,000 people rallied in the bitter winter cold one year ago when Lukashenko was declared winner of a fraud-tainted ballot in which each of his nine rivals was awarded less than three percent of the vote.
The show of fury at the veteran leader's regime led to more than 700 arrests and the imprisonment of six candidates in a crackdown that broke all Western efforts to repair relations with the isolate ex-Soviet state.
Former deputy foreign minister Andrei Sannikov and old Lukashenko foe Mikola Statkevich were jailed for five and six years respectively while two other presidential hopefuls received suspended sentences that bar them from politics.
"This past year taught the people not to expect any positive changes from the government," Sannikov's wife and prominent journalist Irina Khalip said in an interview.
"Our illusions of well-being were shattered. Our government is dead to us."
Khalip was roughly pulled from her car by the police on election night and thrown into a KGB detention centre for six weeks before receiving a suspended sentence for public order offences.
She said she received a summons calling her in for questioning on Monday evening without explanation in an apparent move to prevent her attending commemorations of a night many feel defined Lukashenko's 17-year rule.
Several opposition supporters said they would defy a police ban and light candles on the square opposite the president's office at around 7:00 pm (1600 GMT).
Khalip's summons comes less than a day after Washington and the European Union called on Lukashenko to release and exonerate the rights leaders languishing in jail.
"Over the past 12 months, the Belarusian authorities have imprisoned peaceful demonstrators, suppressed non-violent protests, and worked to silence independent voices," US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and EU High Representative Catherine Ashton said in a joint statement released Sunday.
"We reiterate our call for all political prisoners to be released and rehabilitated," the statement said.
Analysts said the growing reliance by Lukashenko on what is still known as the KGB security service betrays a growing concern over his shrinking support.
A survey by the Lithuanian-registered IISEPS institute showed just 20.5 percent of respondents saying they would vote for Lukashenko today -- the lowest rating since he assumed power 17 years ago.
The vast scale of Lukashenko's security crackdown has even altered the way people talk -- names are rarely mentioned over the phone as a precaution -- and resulted in new waves of Western sanctions at a time of economic crisis.
"He is tightening the screws even further and popular protests will simply be inevitable within the next year or two," former presidential candidate and subsequent KGB detainee Vital Rymasheuski told AFP.
There are grounds for genuine resentment in the nation of nearly 10 million.
Salaries imploded when the state -- burdened by Lukashenko's lavish election promises -- ran out of cash and eventually devalued the currency to less than half its original worth.
Salaries have shrunk accordingly while economists expect the annual inflation rate to hit 120 percent.
The country is now expecting up to $7 billion in economic relief through the end of 2012 from its neighbour and most important ally Russia. But even official statistics point to slowing economic growth.
"Russia gives him time, but only the tiniest bit of it. This money will be gone literally in a few months -- in a year at the most," Rymasheuski said.
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