After Aliaksandr Lukashenka’s meeting with the US special envoy for Belarus John Cole, 250 political prisoners were released, the Belarusian service of Radio Liberty reported on 19 March. State media in Belarus called it a dismissal based on the principle of humanism, which Lukashenko demonstrated.
It is known that 15 of them were taken out of the country, while 235 will remain in Belarus.
There are well-known people among those released. Among them are.
- Katerina Bakhvalova (Andreeva) – journalist of the TV channel “Belsat” in 2021, Katerina received two years behind bars for broadcasting from the square in Minsk. During her imprisonment, she was accused of treason and sentenced to another 8 years and 3 months;
- Anastasia Loyko, a human rights defender and member of the Human Rights Centre “Viasna”, was sentenced to 7 years for allegedly “inciting enmity or discord”;
- Eduard Palchis – a well-known political blogger, author of the Telegram-channel Palchis, public figure. He was an organiser of rallies and concerts “BNR-100”, “BNR-101”. He was sentenced to 13 years in prison on four articles of the Criminal Code.
This is not the first release of Belarusian political prisoners with the participation of American diplomacy.
13 December 2025, it became known about the release of 123 political prisoners, including Nobel Prize winner Ales Beliatski, former presidential candidate Viktor Babarika and his chief of staff Maria Kolesnikova and others.
On 11 September 2025, after the previous meeting between Lukashenka and US representatives, 51 political prisoners were released.
As a result of the meeting of the U.S. presidential envoy Keith Kellogg with Alexander Lukashenko on 21 June, 14 political prisoners were released. Then blogger Siarhei Tikhanouski, former journalist of Radio Liberty Ihar Karnei and other poltv prisoners were dismissed.