Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has visited opposition leaders and political activists detained in a jail in the capital, Minsk, to discuss plans for constitutional reforms, local media say.

The United States has postponed imposing sanctions on Belarus pending consensus by the member states of the European Union (UN) on the introduction of their own punitive measures against Minsk, a report says.

The UK has joined Canada in imposing sanctions on 8 leading figures in the Belarusian establishment, including the country's president.

Tens of thousands of people hold protest rallies across Belarus for a seventh consecutive weekend to demand that President Alexander Lukashenko resign.

Alexander Lukashenko was inaugurated as Belarus president for a sixth term in an unannounced ceremony in Minsk. 

The Belarusian president says Minsk has not asked the West to recognize the legitimacy of the re-elected president.

It happened on the same day as Alexander Lukashenko was sworn in as Belarus president.

The United States has pressed Cyprus to lift an effective veto on sanctions proposed by the European Union (EU) against Belarus, a US official says.

Many protesters were arrested while trying to get detainees out of police vans.

The Belarusian president announces plans to put the military on high alert and shut its western borders amid rising hostility from the US and the EU.