Europe | Meet the hackers

Belarus’s beleaguered opposition is flirting with violence

Is a liberation army forming?

Belarus' President Alexander Lukashenko speaks as he meets with foreign media at his residence, the Independence Palace, in the capital Minsk on February 16, 2023. (Photo by Natalia KOLESNIKOVA / AFP) (Photo by NATALIA KOLESNIKOVA/AFP via Getty Images)
Image: Getty Images
|WARSAW

The cyber Partisans, a group of anonymous dissidents, have hacked their way to the very top of Belarus’s authoritarian regime. They claim that last year when Alexander Lukashenko, the country’s dictatorial president, said he was more scared of cyber weapons than nuclear weapons, he was thinking of them. “What opposition group can say that they have the passport information of all its country’s citizens :)” typed a hacker identified only as Cyber #3. They have reason to grin. The Cyber Partisans are the cutting edge of a militant wing of Belarus’s opposition that is gearing up for action.

This article appeared in the Europe section of the print edition under the headline “Meet the hackers”

From the April 1st 2023 edition

Discover stories from this section and more in the list of contents

Explore the edition

More from Europe

The Russian Army Attacked Kherson With Guided Bombs

Russian trainee pilots appear to be hunting Ukrainian civilians

Residents of Kherson are dodging murderous drones

The “Trumpnado”, a wave shaped like Donald Trump's profile, crushing a boat with a European flag.

Can the good ship Europe weather the Trumpnado?

Tossed by political storms, the continent must dodge a new threat


Demonstrators march, shouting slogans against tourists in Barcelona

Spain’s proposed house tax on foreigners will not fix its shortage

Pedro Sánchez will need the opposition’s help to increase supply


A French-sponsored Ukrainian army brigade has been badly botched

The scandal reveals serious weaknesses in Ukraine’s military command

A TV dramatisation of Mussolini’s life inflames Italy

With Giorgia Meloni in power, the fascist past is more relevant than ever

France’s new prime minister is trying to court the left

François Bayrou gambles with Emmanuel Macron’s economic legacy