A Belarusian opposition leader who rallied mass protests against disputed leader Alexander Lukashenko has been jailed for 18 years.
Sergei Tikhanovsky was convicted of organising riots among other charges following a trial condemned as a sham.
He planned to challenge Mr Lukashenko in the 2020 presidential election, but was detained before the vote.
His wife, Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, took on Mr Lukashenko, who claimed victory in the widely discredited poll.
She claimed victory herself in the August election but, fearing for her safety, was forced into exile with her children the next day.
On Tuesday, Ms Tikhanovskaya questioned the validity of the court that tried her husband and said his sentence amounted to "revenge" by Mr Lukashenko.
"While hiding the political prisoners in closed trials, he hopes to continue repressions in silence. But the whole world watches. We won't stop," Ms Tikhanovskaya wrote in a tweet.
Ahead of the verdict, she said she would keep "defending the person I love" in a Twitter video, which showed children's drawings in the background.
Today, the so-called court in Belarus will deliver the sentence to Siarhei Tsikhanouski. I can imagine these numbers. But be it one year, or 20, or 100, – it is unacceptable. The only question I will ask myself is: what am I going to do with this? #StandWithBelaruspic.twitter.com/9BNLTLCquL
Belarusian state news agency Belta said the verdict was delivered at a court in the south-eastern city of Gomel on Tuesday.
State newspaper Sovetskaya Belarus said five other opposition figures tried alongside Mr Tikhanovsky were sentenced to prison terms ranging from 14 to 16 years. Among them was veteran politician Mikola Statkevich, who was sentenced to 14 years in prison.
They are the latest opposition figures to be jailed in Belarus following a brutal crackdown on dissenting voices who challenged Mr Lukashenko's election win.
Mr Lukashenko has ruled Belarus since 1994 and defied months of protests last year as opposition politicians and activists were arrested and held in prison.
Mr Tikhanovsky is now one of hundreds of political prisoners thought to be held in Belarusian jails. Among them is protest organiser Maria Kolesnikova, who was found guilty of crimes including plotting to seize power and jailed for 11 years in September.
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A 7.4 magnitude earthquake struck off the coast of Indonesia's South Sulawesi province, prompting people to evacuate homes and buildings.
The earthquake happened around 10.30 local time (03:30 GMT) on Tuesday in the Flores Sea. It affected the East Nusa Tenggara region, officials said.
No injuries or major damage has been reported yet but locals said they felt large tremors.
Tsunami warnings for the area were lifted later on Tuesday.
Videos on social media showed people in the city of Makassar running out of shops and buildings. Others showed dozens of people running down the corridors of a hospital in the district of Bantaeng, as a man's voice in the background is heard shouting "An earthquake in the hospital."
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has tested positive for coronavirus amid the growing prevalence of the Omicron variant in the country.
It is not yet known if the 69-year-old is carrying the Omicron variant, which is believed to make up more than 70% of cases in the nation.
He is receiving treatment for mild symptoms, according to a statement from the presidency.
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What can the UK learn from South Africa about fighting Omicron?
Mr Ramaphosa, who is fully vaccinated, took a COVID-19 test on Sunday after he started feeling unwell and is now self-isolating in Cape Town.
He has delegated his responsibilities to Deputy President David Mabuza for the next week.
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President Ramaphosa said his own infection serves as a caution to all people in the country to be vaccinated and remain vigilant against exposure, the statement said.
Vaccination remains the best protection against severe illness and hospital admission, it said.
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Mr Ramaphosa visited four West African countries last week, returning from Senegal last Wednesday.
Some of his delegation tested positive in Nigeria and returned directly to South Africa, but Mr Ramaphosa tested negative throughout the rest of the trip, according to his office.
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Hospitalisations 'not high' in SA
Sky News' Africa correspondent, John Sparks said: "President Ramaphosa is said to be in good spirits this morning down in Cape Town, his symptoms are not too bad we are told.
"He was delivering a eulogy yesterday at the memorial service for the last president of the apartheid area FW de Klerk and word started to filter out that he wasn't feeling that great.
"He went and got a test, tested positive and he has been put into self-isolation in Cape Town. He has handed over the reins of power to his deputy and they released a statement asking South Africans to go out and get a vaccination."
It comes as South Africa recorded more than 18,000 new COVID-19 cases on Sunday night - down from a peak of 22,388 new cases last Thursday.
Infections began rising steeply in early November after a period of low transmission when they were only about 200 per day.
The Omicron variant, which has more than 50 mutations, was detected there on 25 November.
While it appears to be highly transmissible, doctors have said most of the cases have been relatively mild and the percentage of severe cases needing oxygen have been low.
Only about 30% of those hospitalised with COVID-19 in South Africa have been seriously ill, compared with two thirds in the early stages of the previous two waves, according to a study by South Africa's National Institute for Communicable Diseases.
Average hospital stays for COVID-19 have also been shorter this time - about 2.8 days compared with eight days.
ITV News Political Correspondent Daniel Hewitt reports on the PM's emergency plan to tackle Omicron
Over-18s will be offered a Covid booster jab by the end of the year in England, as the target for giving every eligible adult a third dose has been brought forward by a month over fears of a "tidal wave of Omicron" that could cause "very many deaths".
In a televised address to the nation, Boris Johnson announced that from Monday, in England the booster vaccine programme will be opened up to every adult over 18 who has had a second dose of the vaccine at least three months ago - the NHS booking system will be open to the younger age groups from Wednesday.
In a stark warning, the PM told the nation “we must urgently reinforce our wall of vaccine protection”, as he set a new deadline of jabbing everyone over 18 by the new year.
“No one should be in any doubt that there is a tidal wave of Omicron coming and I’m afraid it is now clear that two doses of vaccine are simply not enough to give the level of protection we need,” Mr Johnson.
'We're opening up the booster to every adult', PM announces
He said scientists had discovered that being fully vaccinated is “simply not enough” to prevent the spread of the coronavirus mutation and that, without a lightning speed mass booster campaign, the NHS could be overwhelmed.
The mission to administer millions of jabs by December 31 will see 42 military planning teams deployed across every health region, extra vaccine sites and mobile units, extended clinic opening hours to allow people to be jabbed around the clock and at weekends, and the training of thousands more volunteer vaccinators.
Daniel Hewitt on the timing and manor of the announcement as the PM receives criticism from within his party over alleged Covid-rule-breaking parties
The Omicron variant has concerned scientists since its emergence in South Africa, and the UK has now recorded a total of 3,137 cases after a further 1,239 cases of the mutation were recorded on Sunday. Education Secretary Nadhim Zahawi said the actual number was likely to be 10 times as high.
Speaking on Sunday, the Prime Minister said: “We’ve already seen hospitalisations doubling in a week in South Africa and we have patients with Omicron here in the UK right now.
“At this point our scientists cannot say that Omicron is less severe.
“And even if that proved to be true we already know it is so much more transmissible that a wave of Omicron through a population that was not boosted would risk a level of hospitalisation that could overwhelm our NHS and lead sadly to very many deaths.
ITV News Health Editor Emily Morgan on the 'monumental challenge' to vaccinate millions before new year
“So we must act now. Today we are launching the Omicron emergency booster national mission, unlike anything we’ve done before in the vaccination programme, to get boosted now.
“A fortnight ago I said we would offer every eligible adult a booster by the end of January.
“Today in light of this Omicron emergency I’m bringing that target forward by a whole month.
“Everyone eligible aged 18 and over in England will have the chance to get their booster before the new year.”
People coming from 11 African countries have to pay more than £2,000 for hotel quarantine (Picture: AFP/Getty Images)
The UK and its European neighbours have been accused of inflicting ‘travel apartheid’ on African countries placed on red lists.
South African scientists told the world they had discovered the mutant Omicron variant on November 25. Whilst governments around the world thanked the country for its transparency, the announcement quickly backfired.
Some 11 African nations were put onto the UK’s red list, with much of Europe and the US quickly following suit.
It means most entry to the UK is banned and anyone arriving from these places has to pay around £2,285 for the Government’s hotel quarantine package and two PCR tests.
African leaders and international health experts have pushed back against these restrictions with the United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres dubbing the rules ‘travel apartheid’.
Speaking earlier this month, Mr Guterres said: ‘We have the instruments to have safe travel. Let’s use those instruments to avoid this kind of, allow me to say, travel apartheid, which I think is unacceptable.’
Nigeria’s high commissioner to London, Sarafa Tunji Isola, said the UK should not panic about Omicron (Picture: PA)
When Nigeria was added to the UK’s red list on December 6, the country’s high commissioner to London, Sarafa Tunji Isola, quoted Mr Guterres.
He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘Nigeria is actually aligned with the position of the UN secretary-general – that the travel ban is apartheid’.
Mr Isola went on to claim that Omicron is ‘mild variant’, insisting it is not a strain to panic about.
Indeed, the South African president, Cyril Ramaphosa, has also said the global bans are ‘no longer informed by science’.
Although it is too early to tell whether the Omicron variant evades vaccines, several South African scientists have said infected people exhibit symptoms milder than those with Delta.
Other experts believe the variant has not been studied for long enough to know Omicron’s effects on hospitalisations and deaths.
Even if ‘milder symptoms’ ends up being true for South Africa, the country has a much younger population than the UK and scientists want more data on how Omicron affects the elderly.
But Omicron has already been found in many European countries. There were 1,898 confirmed cases in the UK on Saturday and this number, which is probably higher in reality, goes up every day.
Omicron will be the UK’s dominant variant by mid-January, it has been predicted (Picture: MailOnline)
Top epidemiologist Professor Tim Spector believes the UK will have more Omicron cases than most African countries in less than 10 days.
If true, this would leave ‘very little point’ in enforcing travel restrictions, the King’s College scientist added.
Indeed, the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) predicts Omicron will account for more than 50% of the UK’s cases by as early as next week.
The seemingly inevitable dominance of Omicron is what African leaders argue is the ‘pointlessness’ in travel restrictions.
But besides this, Mr Rhamaposa said it was unfair for the west to penalise poorer nations with rising cases after depriving those countries of vaccines in the first place.
Vaccine inequality is dangerous but also completely avoidable. A year into the world’s most ambitious vaccination drive, no country should lack sufficient access to vaccines.  #ACTAcceleratorpic.twitter.com/k0Hd1eha5d
He said last Thursday: ‘This pandemic has shown how we respond to a truly global crisis.
‘[The west] ordered more vaccines than their populations required and when we wanted vaccines, they kept giving us the crumbs from their tables.
‘Of nearly 7.5-billion doses of Covid-19 vaccines administered globally by mid-November, 71% had been administered in high-income and upper-middle-income countries. Only 0.6% had been administered in low-income countries. Africa is the hardest hit by the inequitable access to vaccines.
‘As the events of the past few days have shown, we live with the threat from mutating variants which have the potential to unleash further devastation in communities globally.’
Vaccinations are down in pooer nations because of hoarding, poor infrastructure and vaccine hesitancy (Picture: Getty Images)
Indeed, every single adult in the UK will be offered a third booster shot by January whilst South Africa has a fully vaccinated population of just 25.93%.
Nigeria has only jabbed 1.91% of its people and Malawi and Zambia, which have also been placed on the red list, have vaccinated less than 5%.
However, it is important to note that whilst many African countries have now received the jabs they were entitled to, inoculation programmes are hindered by poor infrastructure and vaccine hesitancy.
The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) said: ‘Throughout the pandemic the government has been guided by the science and the advice of health experts to ensure that steps minimise the risk of importing COVID-19 cases and variants from abroad.’
