Belarus on Tuesday raised retail gasoline prices by 30 percent on average as the authorities made a fresh bid to keep a lid on an economic crisis while seeking an IMF bailout, according to Reuters. The hike by state fuel firm Belneftekhim, which raises the cost of a litre of gasoline at the pump to about $1, is the third in two months and means prices have nearly doubled since March, eating away at ordinary Belarussians' dwindling incomes. The move follows a 36 percent devaluation of the country's rouble , a price freeze on some staple foods and the introduction of fuel rationing. Scores of motorists staged an evening protest rally -- rare for Belarus which has been under the rule of authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko for 16 years -- along Minsk's main thoroughfare in protest at the price hike. Protesters, hooting their car horns, stopped their cars and raised the lid of their trunks to demonstrate their dismay at the gasoline price rises -- the latest blow to hit the living standards of ordinary Belarussians. Riot police made no move to break up the protest. The step was taken "to protect the domestic market from unsanctioned exports of oil products and to decrease the disparity in car fuel prices between Belarus and neighbouring countries," Belneftekhim said in a statement. Earlier this month the government of President Alexander Lukashenko imposed a limit of 25 litres of gasoline per purchase on motorists.
