Belarus freed 25 political prisoners on Wednesday in an interim deal with Washington that traded their release for the lifting of American sanctions on two Belarusian companies. The agreement was announced by John Coale, President Donald Trump’s personal envoy, after a day of talks with President Alexander Lukashenko in Minsk. The released prisoners were taken across the border to Vilnius, Lithuania, the same day.
“We agreed to an interim deal, and as a show of goodwill Belarus will release 25 people and in exchange the United States will lift sanctions on two companies,” Coale told reporters in the Belarusian capital. “We will continue to improve US-Belarus relations and are working to secure the release of more people in the very near future. We are not finished!”
The two companies are Bellesbumprom, a wood-processing and paper producer, and Lakokraska, the country’s largest manufacturer of paints, varnishes, and anti-corrosion coatings. EU sanctions on Belarus remain untouched. The deal is the latest step in negotiations stretching back more than a year, in which Washington has pressed Lukashenko — in power since 1994 and Vladimir Putin’s closest ally — to free hundreds of detainees, including human rights campaigners, activists, journalists, and lawyers, in return for sanctions relief and an easing of his international isolation.
This round’s releases, however, were modest compared with Coale’s last trip: when he visited Minsk in March, he persuaded Lukashenko to free 250 prisoners. Earlier in the process, the US had lifted sanctions on Belaruskali, the fertilizer producer whose potash exports are one of Belarus’s main sources of hard currency.
Among those freed this time were journalist Andrei Alyaksandrau, who had been serving a 14-year sentence, and his wife Iryna Zlobina, sentenced to nine years. Also released was Liudmila Chekina, head of the independent news portal TUT.BY, shut down in 2021, who had been serving 12 years, along with a trio of musicians arrested in 2022 after their songs were designated “extremist materials.” Exiled opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya said all 25 had arrived safely in Lithuania. “Every person released is a victory,” she wrote. “The work must continue until all political prisoners are free.” Coale himself has credited direct diplomacy with the results, posting on X that “25 prisoners are free today! President Trump’s commitment to direct diplomacy delivers results.”
The human rights group Viasna, banned in Belarus, says more than 900 political prisoners remain behind bars even after the waves of releases Coale has negotiated since last year. The most common charges are “extremist” activity, conspiring to seize power, incitement to hatred, or insulting the president. And Lukashenko’s government has denied allegations — raised by some critics — that it is simply replenishing its prisons with new arrests to keep the bargaining chips coming.
Coale told Reuters he expects to return in about a month and hopes that visit will see “hundreds” more released. Whether that happens will depend on what each side still demands: the US wants the prisoner rolls emptied, while Lukashenko is clearly testing how much Western pressure he can trade away per concession. For now, the exchange rate is known: 25 lives, two companies. The next round will show whether the price of the rest is one Washington is willing to keep paying — and one Minsk is willing to keep setting.
