Belarus frees five political prisoners in rare amnesty

Belarus has released five political prisoners in a rare act of amnesty, nearly four years after President Alexander Lukashenko initiated a severe crackdown on his domestic opponents.

Lukashenko, who has been in power since 1994, launched widespread repressions following his contested victory in the 2020 presidential election, leading to the detention of thousands in the ensuing protests.

On Tuesday, during a press briefing in Minsk, he expressed his intention to release some “seriously ill” prisoners.

According to the leading human rights group Viasna, there are still over 1,400 political prisoners in Belarus.

On Wednesday, three men and two women were released from custody, Viasna reported.

One of the released prisoners, Rygor Kastusev, was identified. The 67-year-old, who ran against Lukashenko in the 2010 election, was detained during a wave of arrests in 2021 and had been diagnosed with cancer, according to Viasna.

Kastusev’s daughter Galina confirmed his release, stating that her father was “very happy to be free.”

“We saw each other, and everyone got excited, and started crying. We saw that he was home, everything is fine,” she said.

Another political prisoner, Irina Schastnaya, was released on June 29. The opposition journalist, arrested in 2021 and sentenced to four years in prison, ran the My Country Belarus Telegram channel before her arrest. The channel announced her release on Wednesday after she had left the country.

Lukashenko said on Tuesday that the amnesty would apply to those he accused of “smashing up or undermining the country in 2020” and who were “truly ill, mostly with cancer.”

Exiled opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, believed by many to have defeated Lukashenko in the 2020 election, cautiously welcomed the releases.

“I am glad to see these people free and reunited with their loved ones,” she wrote in a post on X, formerly Twitter.

However, she emphasized that many political prisoners remained incarcerated, with over 200 in “critical health conditions.”

“Already, at least six have died behind bars. They must be released unconditionally. Their urgent release is not a political issue, but a humanitarian one,” she wrote.

Tikhanovskaya’s husband, Sergei Tikhanovsky, is among those still imprisoned. He was arrested in May 2020, just two days after announcing his intention to challenge Lukashenko in the presidential election, and hasn’t been heard from in over a year. A spokesperson for Tikhanovskaya told AFP that there was no indication he would be among those released.

There are also concerns for Maria Kolesnikova, an opposition activist who tore up her passport after authorities attempted to force her out of Belarus in September 2020. She was later sentenced to 10 years in prison. Her lawyer reported earlier this year that he hadn’t had contact with her since February 2023.

For decades, Mr Lukashenko sought to play Russia and the European Union off against each other. His established practice was to release political prisoners to win favour with leaders in Brussels and spark a thaw in relations.

But that relationship ended in 2020, after he claimed victory in the presidential election and launched waves of repressions.

Since then Mr Lukashenko has become reliant on President Vladimir Putin for support, after the Russian leader agreed to send troops to help prop up his regime as thousands of Belarusians took to the streets in mass protests.

It seems unlikely that Wednesday’s releases signal a return to Mr Lukashenko’s previous attempts to appeal to the West, considering the modest number of prisoners released.

Scores of detainees remain unheard from, while the secret police have continued to arrest others accused of undermining the regime.

Even on Wednesday, as the five detainees walked free after years in detention, Viasna classified eight other people as political prisoners.