(15 Mar 2006)
1. Exterior of Popular Front headquarters
2. Poster of Milinkevich, main opposition candidate
3. People putting up a poster of Milinkevich
4. Milinkevich walking into news conference
5. Cutaway of microphones
6. Milinkevich sitting down for news conference
7. Cutaway of press
8. SOUNDBITE: (Russian) Alexander Milinkevich, Opposition candidate:
"People are interested in their future, people believe they can change the future, and not live in a country of economic and political stagnation. But I have to say that in many respects apathy has already won in this country, I can see this from my meetings, from the press, the Internet."
9. Cutaway of press
10. SOUNDBITE (Russian) Alexander Milinkevich, Opposition candidate:
"As far as the elections on March 19 are concerned, at all my meetings, I have always said that we were against any kind of revolution and we are today against revolution. We are for peaceful evolutionary development in Belarus. We are not bringing the people onto the streets, it's the authorities who are doing this."
9. Pan from press to Milinkevich
10. SOUNDBITE (Russian) Alexander Milinkevich, Opposition candidate:
"We have told the power structures that we are not your enemy. Among you are many people who support change in this country and so we hope we have reason to prevail among them even if they are given illegal orders. I have already said that we are getting a constant stream of information from the power structures, the security organs about planned provocations."
11. Cutaway camera
12. Milinkevich and supporter look at newspaper
13. Milinkevich supporters
14. Various of supporters with banners outside.
STORYLINE:
The main opposition candidate vying for votes in a Belarusian national election called on Wednesday for peaceful protests if the Sunday vote is considered fraudulent, but a government ban on rallies has potentially set the stage for violent confrontation.
Alexander Milinkevich urged law enforcement officers not to use force against demonstrators.
Belarusian authorities detained another opposition party leader and barred three members of an international monitoring mission from the country on Wednesday ahead of a weekend presidential election that the opposition fears will be rigged.
Authorities also barred two Polish members of an international monitoring mission from entering the country.
State-run media marked Constitution Day by praising authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko, criticising his opponents, and hinting at Western plots to interfere in Sunday's vote in the ex-Soviet republic.
Amid fears of election day violence, the main opposition candidate accused the government of plotting to provoke unrest and appealed to security forces to defy their superiors if they issue illegal orders to use force against demonstrators.
Meanwhile, students and others continued casting ballots in strongly encouraged early voting that the opposition says is a ploy by the state to manipulate the results in favour of Lukashenko.
Lukashenko has ruled the nation of 10-million with an iron fist since 1994, quashing dissent and maintaining his grip on power through votes dismissed as illegitimate by critics.
He is seeking five more years at the helm after pushing through a referendum scrapping term limits.
Lukashenko has vowed to prevent the kind of change that swept Georgia, Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan, where street protests after disputed elections have helped bring opposition leaders to power.
He has accused the West of seeking to foment similar protests in Belarus.
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