Belarusian diaspora

Another part of the Belarusian diaspora are people who migrated within the USSR before 1991 and who after its dissolution became inhabitants of other post-Soviet countries.

A separate faction usually associated with the Belarusian diaspora are ethnic minorities in the borderlands of Belarus with Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Russia and Ukraine.

A separate group of emigrants from Belarus are Belarusian Jews who have established significant communities in the United States and Israel.

The earliest Belarusian emigrants came in the seventeenth century to the Netherlands and the United States under the pressure of the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Counter-Reformation in Belarus.

Belarusians later migrated to Siberia and the Far East after their lands were occupied in the eighteenth century by the Russian Empire.

Belarusians immigrated in large numbers to the United States once a rebellion from 1863 to 1864 that was led by Kastus Kalinouski was crushed by Tsarist forces.

The demographics included a mix of people "who were running from the Soviets, victims of Stalin’s pre-war repressions, some Nazi collaborators and thousands of young Belarusian forced laborers who stayed in Europe after WWII."

Most of these Belarusian immigrants moved to Canada, Australia, Brazil, and the US while some stayed in Germany, France, and the UK.

The latest wave of emigration from Belarus includes professionals such as software and other engineers, scientists, students and athletes.

[4] Several thousand Belarusian refugees and soldiers of the Anders' Army landed in France after World War II.

[7] Several thousand Belarusian refugees and soldiers of the Anders Army landed in Great Britain after World War II.

As the capital of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the city has historically been the centre of Belarusian cultural life.

There is a sizeable Belarusian minority in Lithuania today, consisting of Soviet-era migrants and post-Soviet arrivals, including political refugees.

Lviv has been an important center of Belarusian social and cultural life during the Russian Empire and interwar Poland.

[12] It is difficult to estimate the real number of Canadians of Belarusian descent because immigrants from Belarus were often classified as Poles or Russians (sometimes Lithuanians, i.e., Litviny), or sometimes as Ukrainians.

It is difficult to estimate the real number of Americans of Belarusian descent because immigrants from Belarus were often classified as Poles or Russians (sometimes Lithuanians, i.e., Litviny), or sometimes as Ukrainians.

Unlike in other western countries, Belarusian organizations in Argentina were pro-Soviet and fell under influence of the Soviet embassy.