Belarusian Popular Front

The Belarusian Popular Front "Revival" (BPF, ; Biełaruski Narodny Front "Adradžeńnie", BNF) was a social and political movement in Belarus in the late 1980s and 1990s whose goals were national revival of Belarus, its democratization and independence from the Soviet Union. Its leader was Zianon Pazniak It was similar to the Popular Fronts of Latvia and Estonia, and the Sąjūdis movement in Lithuania. Creation The predecessor of BPF was civic organization "" whose goal was to commemorate the victims of Soviet political repressions in Belarus. Among the significant achievements of the organization was the 1988 uncovering by Pazniak of the burial site of Kurapaty near Minsk, a major NKVD mass extermination site of Soviet political prisoners in the 1930s. The Belarusian Popular Front was established in 1989, following the examples of the Popular Fronts in the Baltic states. Its founding conference had to be organized in Vilnius because of pressure from the authorities of the Byelorussian SSR. Initially, the Popular Front united numerous minor organizations promoting the Belarusian language and history. However, soon the movement began voicing political demands, supporting the Perestroika and democratization in the Soviet Union which would enable a Belarusian national revival. The Popular Front was the first political organization in Belarus to openly oppose the Communist Party of Byelorussia.