; 22 U.S.C. 5811 note) is amended to read as follows: 2. Findings Congress finds the following: (1) Consistently, Alyaksandr Lukashenka, the illegitimate leader of Belarus, engages in a pattern of clear and persistent violations of human rights, democratic governance, and fundamental freedoms. (2) Alyaksandr Lukashenka has overseen and participated in multiple fundamentally flawed presidential and parliamentary elections undermining the legitimacy of executive, judicial, and legislative authority in Belarus. (3) On August 9, 2020, the Government of Belarus conducted a presidential election that was fraudulent and did not meet international standards. There were serious irregularities with ballot counting and the reporting of election results. The Government of Belarus also put in place restrictive measures that impeded the work of local independent observers and did not provide sufficient notice to the OSCE to allow for the OSCE to monitor the elections, as is customary. (4) Independent election monitors recognized Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya as the legitimate winner of the August 9, 2020 election for president in Belarus following her candidacy after her husband, opposition leader Sergei Tikhanovsky, was imprisoned for challenging Lukashenka for president in 2020. (5) Following threats to her safety, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya was forced into exile in Lithuania after Mr. Lukashenka claimed victory in the fraudulent 2020 elections, and since that time, the Government of Lithuania has hosted the Office of Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, the Belarusian Democratic Leader, and the Government of Poland has hosted the Belarusian United Transitional Cabinet. (6) Thousands of employees at Belarusian state-owned enterprises went on strike across the country to protest Mr. Lukashenka’s illegitimate election and the subsequent crackdowns on peaceful protestors to the contested results of the election, including at some of Belarus’s largest factories such as the BelAZ truck plant, the Minsk Tractor Works, and the Minsk Automobile