Fifty-two inmates, including opposition leader Mikola Stackevich, were released last week, and are said to be back at the back of the bar.
Released on September 16, 2025
Belarus has forgiven 25 prisoners as part of a continuous drive to improve relations with the United States.
President Alexander Lukashenko’s office announced its decision Tuesday, less than a week after US President Donald Trump released dozens of prisoners after an appeal that he would release hundreds of people said to have been charged with politically motivated charges.
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The state news outlet Belta reported that 12 women and 13 men were allowed, not identified by name. According to the Viasna Human Rights Group, at least some of those who were pardoned were political prisoners.
More than 1,000 political prisoners are behind the bar, according to rights groups. This is being detained as part of a brutal crackdown on the protests in the 2020 election, when Lukashenko returned to power over the sixth term. The president was re-elected for the seventh term this year.
Trump is pushing for their release, reportedly lifting sanctions against the Belarusian national airline. US envoy John Kohl recently said Washington wanted to reopen its Minsk embassy, indicating the possibility of melting relations between the two countries.
Opposition figures have returned to prison
Last week’s release of 52 political prisoners included staff from the EU delegation in Minsk and nine journalists and bloggers, including a US-funded reporter for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.
The released prisoners were on a bus across the border to EU member Lithuania, where they were greeted by exiled opposition.
However, a well-known opposition member, Mikola Stackevich, who refused to be deported after his release, has been returned to prison, according to a report released Monday by independent news outlet Nashaniva.
“Stackevich was found in the colony of the Fribokai prison,” opposition leader Sviatrana Tskanuskaya said, “I urge the international community to demand his freedom.”
Nasha Niva, an independent news outlet, said the 69-year-old, who fought Lukashenko in the 2010 presidential election, had been held solitary confinement in a prison in Fribokae for the past two years and seven months.
The exiled opposition says that freed prisoners should have the right to remain in Belarus, rather than being forced to leave the country.
Western countries, including the US, the EU and the UK, have imposed numerous sanctions on Belarus in recent years for human rights records and support for Russian wars in Ukraine.
