The death of a protester has inflamed tensions in Belarus, with thousands praising the 31-year-old as a hero at his funeral. His last message — "I'm going out" — became a new slogan of the protest movement.
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Several thousand mourners paid their respects to opposition activist Raman Bandarenka at a church ceremony in Minsk on Friday, decrying the death of the 31-year-old professional soldier who they believe lost his life in an altercation with Belarus security forces.
The attendants formed a half-kilometer (550 yards) line stretching from the church until the coffin was carried out. They occasionally chanted "We will not forget, we will not forgive," and "Rama, you are a hero."
The mourners also chanted "I'm going out," the last message sent by Bandarenka to a group chat on a messaging app before he was killed.
According to authorities, Bandarenka got into a fight with a group of civilians while intoxicated. He sustained brain damage and passed away in a hospital last week. Witnesses, however, say Bandarenka was attacked and detained while confronting a group of people wearing civilian clothes, after the group came to a local playground to remove red-and-white ribbons symbolizing the protest movement.
Protesters believe the men were members of the security forces, and that Bandarenka was beaten to death. The news of his passing enraged the protesters who have been demanding strongman Alexander Lukashenko step down since August. At least two other protesters have so far lost their lives, with many others missing.
How flower power can overturn a system
From the carnation to the jasmine, flowers have long been fighting for peace and freedom. In Belarus, protesters are also using flowers to demand change.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/V. Sharifulin
Flowers for a new Belarus
Reacting to the police's brutal crackdown on demonstrators following the contested reelection of longtime President Alexander Lukashenko, Belarusian women adopted powerful symbols of peace to pursue the protests. Dressed in white and bearing flowers, they marched and formed solidarity chains in the streets of Minsk, the country's capital. Flowers have often served as a revolutionary symbol.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/V. Sharifulin
The Carnation Revolution
Military rule ran for nearly 50 years in Portugal. Arbitrary torture and censorship were imposed by generals such as Carmona and later Salazar. In 1974, army dissidents led to the fall of what was then Europe's oldest dictatorship. The citizens of Lisbon celebrated the nearly bloodless uprising with revolutionary red carnations. The period that followed was called the Third Portuguese Republic.
Image: Herve Gloaguen/Gamma-Rapho/Getty Images
The Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia
Another flower revolution is the Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia, named after the country's national flower. In January 2011, demonstrators overthrew the autocratic ruler Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, who had led the country for over 20 years before fleeing from the protests to Saudi Arabia.
Image: AFP/Getty Images/F. Belaid
The blooming Arab Spring
The popular uprising in Tunisia marked the beginning of the Arab Spring, a wave of revolutionary protests which then followed in Egypt, Libya and other countries in North Africa and the Middle East. Tunisia still serves as the best example of a successful revolution. Although further protests followed the overthrow of the government, the country is considered relatively stable.
Image: C. Furlong/Getty Images
No peace in Syria
The multi-sided civil war is still ongoing in Syria, where this picture was taken in May 2013. The photo shows a Kurdish rebel of the Syrian Kurdish Popular Protection Units (YPG) in Aleppo with a flower in his Russian AK-47. Seven years later, there is still no end in sight to the conflict.
Image: AFP/Getty Images
Jasmines in China
Inspired by the successful uprisings in the Arab world, pro-democracy protests also started in China in 2011. In a clear reference to the events in Tunisia, protestors wore jasmine flowers. The Chinese authorities reacted quickly: Jasmines were banned in flower markets. On the internet, searches for the term "jasmine" were also blocked.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/How Hwee Young
Rose Revolution in Georgia
Though perhaps not as famous, another flower revolution took place in Georgia. In 2003, the protests that came to be known as the "Rose Revolution" led to the resignation of President (and former foreign minister of the Soviet Union) Eduard Shevardnadze. Protesters literally applied a quote from the first Georgian president: "We will throw roses instead of bullets on our enemies."
Image: picture-alliance/AP Photo/S. Aivazov
Tulip Revolution in Kyrgyzstan
After parliamentary elections in February 2005, popular unrest in Kyrgyzstan led to the overthrow of President Akayev. Rioters used the symbol of the opposition, the mountain tulip. The situation remained unstable until Kyrgyzstan established a parliamentary republic in 2010. Human rights organizations nevertheless still report restrictions on freedom of the press and of expression.
Image: AFP/Getty Images/V. Drachev
Flowers and colors
The Tulip and Rose Revolutions are among the so-called color revolutions, a wave of protest movements in the former Soviet Union during the early 2000s, which also includes the Orange Revolution in Ukraine. Flowers were already used in political protest much earlier: For instance, social democrats adopted the red rose as a symbol. Hippies protested against the Vietnam War with flowers too.
Image: Colourbox/Z. Krstic
Flowers in Thailand
Reacting to protests in 2013, the Thai government reversed the usual roles and let policemen distribute flowers to the demonstrators. After months of power struggles between the pro-government "Red Shirts" and the opposition coalition of "Yellow Shirts," the military seized power in a coup in 2014 and imposed martial law on the country.
Image: C. Archambault/AFP/Getty Images
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What was the government's reaction?
The protesters' narrative was boosted by a leaked medical report that showed Bandarenka did not have alcohol in his blood. The authorities responded by detaining the medical worker who allegedly leaked the report and a journalist who published it.
President Lukashenko has expressed his condolences to Bandarenka's family a day after his death and urged people not to politicize the issue, while also citing the reports that claimed the soldier was drunk. On the day of the funeral, Lukashenko pledged that he would unveil new information regarding the death next week.
He told a reporter to "wait a little bit, we will say everything next week. Trust me, it will be very interesting," the leader said without providing details.