“He had nothing for us,” Lukashenko told a news conference in Minsk, adding that Shishov’s death in Kiev had caused tensions in Belarus’s relations with Ukraine.
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Shishov, who disappeared in Kiev last Monday, was found hanging in a park near his residence a day later. Police admit there may have been a murder disguised as suicide.
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Shishov, 26, led the NGO “House of Belarus in Ukraine”, which provides assistance to Belarusians who have fled repression in their country. The organization blames Shishov’s death on the Lukashenko regime.
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“Who crazy would go and hang him?” Lukashenko said, adding that he would have enough people to deal with without Shishov.
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Mr Lukashenko accused Ukraine’s security services of supporting Shishov and demanded that Ukraine “disclose all the facts”.
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“Tell us what happened to the Belarusian citizen,” Lukashenko said.
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He also denied that Minsk had tried to force sprinter Kristina Cimanouska, a member of the Belarusian Olympic team, to go home. Mr Lukashenko said Cimanousku was controlled by Poland, which had granted her a visa on humanitarian grounds.
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“She would not have done it if she had not been controlled by her members in Poland,” the Belarusian dictator said, saying that no Belarusian secret service agent had been present at the Tokyo Olympics.
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