US President’s Special Envoy for Belarus John Coale said he believes all political prisoners in Belarus could be released by the end of the year. He made the statement in an interview with his wife Greta Van Susteren on Newsmax.
“We believe we will be able to free more people and, hopefully, by the end of the year get everyone out,” Coale said.
Coale confirmed that of the 250 people released on March 19, 235 remained in Belarus. This, he said, was achieved through “fairly tough negotiations” with the Belarusian authorities.
Fifteen of those released were taken to Lithuania. According to Coale, these include foreign nationals or well-known individuals.
The US envoy also said he is working to improve relations between Belarus and Lithuania, including addressing issues with meteorological balloons and “small problems that have turned into big ones.”
“I have made good progress with Lithuania. Today I raised these issues with President Lukashenka. We are taking good steps toward peace between these two countries,” he said.
It should be recalled that following talks between Coale and Alyaksandr Lukashenka, 250 political prisoners were released on March 19. Of these, 235 remained in Belarus, while 15 were sent to Lithuania without passports. Among them were journalist Katsiaryna Bakhvalava (Andreyeva), human rights defenders Valiantsin Stefanovic, Marfa Rabkova, Nasta Loika, Mikita Zalatarou, who had been detained at the age of 16, and blogger Eduard Palchys.
The United States also announced the lifting of sanctions on Belinvestbank, the Development Bank of Belarus, and the Ministry of Finance, as well as the removal of the Belarusian Potash Company and Belaruskali from all sanctions lists.
