Belarusian politician and opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya has said it was a "great honour" to receive the Tipperary International Peace Award today.
Speaking at Saint Mary's Church of Ireland in Tipperary town today, Ms Tsikhanouskaya said: "It is a great honour for me to receive the Tipperary Peace Award.
"To all the thousands of our political prisoners, and to their families, with this award, they will know that they are not alone in their struggle.
"Because of this award, they will know that Ireland is standing with them," she said.
The awards committee said Ms Tsikhanouskaya received the accolade as a statement of support for the rights to freedom of speech, freedom of association, and freedom of assembly in Belarus, which she has actively campaigned for.
Ms Tsikhanouskaya ran in the 2020 Belarusian presidential election after her husband, Sergei Tsikhanousky, was arrested and imprisoned when he announced his intention to contest the election.
Ms Tsikhanouskaya spent time in north Tipperary as a child as part of a programme for children from radiation-hit areas following the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.
During her visit to Ireland in 2021, when she met political leaders in Dublin, she visited Roscrea and met her host family again. She has also seen them again during this visit.
Her husband remains in solitary confinement in prison in Belarus.
Award is not for me but for Belarusian people - Tsikhanouskaya
Ms Tsikhanouskaya said the award is not for her but for the Belarusian people.
Speaking on RTÉ's Morning Ireland, she said it is for all those "who fearlessly and peacefully fight for freedom and democracy, this award also goes to our political prisoners, who even being in prison don't give up".
She added that she believes "this award will attract attention to Belarus because the fight for freedom is a global one".
Ireland is like her "second home" and "it's like a green paradise with warm people", she said.
She recounted how when she first came to Ireland, she was shocked as she "saw people smiling".
Ms Tsikhanouskaya said at that time Belarus was a "dark atmosphere, people were just surviving because of poor economic situation. And I just discovered a new world for me.
"For years I kept connection with the family that hosted me back then and yesterday, the Dean's family visited me in Tipperary and it was like meeting with my family, actually."
She praised the organisations that brought the children to Ireland after the Chernobyl disaster, saying it was a "huge opportunity for us to improve our health conditions, to see how other people live and to see how European countries differs from the country we lived in".
In relation to her husband, she said that he has been kept in solitary confinement for three years and she has not had any news from him for about a month.
She said this is a "strategy of the regime to deprive lawyers who defend political prisoners' licenses and our political prisoners don't have communication with lawyers, with their families".
She added that "people who sacrificed their freedom and their lives actually for democratic Belarus, they're not giving up".
Ms Tsikhanouskaya is unable to return to Belarus as she will be detained immediately, she said.
"You know that I got 15 years of jail in absentia, and of course [Belarusian president Alexander] Lukashenka considers me a personal enemy. So that's why you can't do a lot inside Belarus because repressions are awful.
"About 20 people are being detained every day in our country. So, I will not be able to do anything from inside, from jail. So that's why I have to work from exile. To be the voice of the Belarusian people, to unite people and to lead our fight for democratic changes."
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She said that when the war in Ukraine started a lot changed for the Belarusian people as well.
"[The] majority of those say 'no' to the war they have [an] anti-war position.
"They are helping Ukrainians as much as they can, but all those who are opposing the war became enemies of the regime as well."
She said that from the moment the Ukraine war started people realised "that we are not the same as Russians, because Russian people, they are supporting this war, they are against Ukrainians, but our nations, Ukrainian and the Belarusian, are very close.
"And we don't want to lose this relationship.
"That's why when the war has started, the Belarusian partisan movement appeared, and the Belarusian partisans disrupted railways to slow down Russian equipment that was going through our country to Ukraine.
"Belarusian partisans blew up a very expensive surveillance airplane in [a] Belarusian airport."
She said there are some fighters in Ukraine fighting "shoulder to shoulder" with Ukrainian people.
Ms Tsikhanouskaya said Belarusians who "became refugees for political persecution are helping Ukrainian refugees" because they know what it means to live in fear for your child and have top leave your country.
"So, I know that the state of Belarus and Ukraine are intertwined. Without free Ukraine, there might not be free Belarus, but also vice versa, without free Belarus, there will be no safety in the whole region."
She urged the West to use all economic and political pressure on Belarus as Mr Lukashenka is supporting Russian President Vladimir Putin "pressure has to be imposed on both dictators.
"And now we see that Lukashenka and Putin, they circumvent sanctions through Belarus and Russia.
"So that's why the sanctions should be synchronised, of course to avoid impunity."
She said there is already signs of "creeping occupation" of Belarus by Russia.
"We feel the presence of Russian military of Russians in a military sphere and economic sphere, media, cultural sphere. And of course, I suppose the Kremlin doesn't see Belarus as a separate state and we realise that our independence is at stake at the moment.
"Lukashenka piece by piece [is] selling our sovereignty to Russia because Russia, supported him, politically and economically.
"Of course, the world should [be] alarmed about the situation and the possible deployment of nuclear weapons is very certain... because even after changes it will be so difficult to get rid of nuclear weapons from our territory. It could have very bad consequences for our country."
She added that she is waiting for "strong countries" to speak out about the deployment of nuclear weapons "and this deployment must be prevented".
