The European Union is expected to ban some Belarus officials from its territory and freeze bilateral links between member states and Minsk to protest what it called fraudulent elections in the former Soviet republic

The European Union is expected to ban some Belarus officials from its territory and freeze bilateral links between member states and Minsk to protest what it called fraudulent elections in the former Soviet republic. A draft statement, due to be approved by EU foreign ministers on Monday, urges President Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus to change his policies, which have isolated the impoverished nation of 10 million people. It says the EU's 25 ministers will ban Minsk officials who were responsible for general elections last month and a referendum that scrapped a rule limiting Lukashenko to two terms as president. The EU said the voting was flawed. Belarus police officers broke up rallies that followed the Oct. 17 elections, arresting dozens of opposition activists. An EU diplomat said a tentative list of candidates for exclusion included the head of the state electoral commission, the head of the KGB security service, a deputy interior minister and the head of the presidential administration.