Alexander Lukashenko, Europe’s longest-serving leader, has extended his 31-year rule in Belarus after being declared the winner of a presidential election that his exiled opponents and Western countries have denounced as a sham.

Belarus held an orchestrated election over the weekend that the opposition and the EU rejected as a farce, extending President Lukashenko's more than 30 years in power.

Europe’s longest-serving leader won re-election in a contest widely believe to have been rigged. The result cements the power of a leader whose country is considered Russia’s staunchest ally.