Belarus released more than 100 political prisoners on Saturday, including Nobel Peace Prize winner Ales Bialiatski and activist Maria Kolesnikova, after the U.S. agreed to remove some sanctions from the country.
Belarus released a total of 123 prisoners following talks between authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko and U.S. President Donald Trump’s special envoy for Belarus, John Coale, according to media reports.
The U.S. agreed to lift sanctions on potash, a key fertilizer component and an important export for Belarus, a historical ally of Russia.
“The United States is lifting sanctions on potash,” Coale told journalists. “I think this is a very good step by the U.S. toward Belarus. We are lifting them now,” he said.
“As relations between the two countries normalize, more and more sanctions will be lifted,” Coale added.
The U.S. State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Kolesnikova was sentenced four years ago to a long prison term after being convicted of attempting to seize power illegally.
Coale had already helped facilitate the release of more than 50 political prisoners from Belarus this year, and he has a mandate from Trump to secure the release of more. According to human rights group Viasna, there are still more than 1,000 political prisoners in the country.
The U.S. president has for months been keen to work with Lukashenko — whom he has repeatedly lauded — to release prisoners while seeking to bolster relations between the two countries. After Coale last met with Lukashenko in September, Belarus released more than 50 prisoners; in return, the U.S. lifted some sanctions on the country’s national airline.
Gregory Svirnovskiy contributed reporting.
Belarus frees opposition figures as US lifts some sanctions
Source: Viral Showbiz Pinay
0 Comments