But amid rising expectations for ceasefire talks over Ukraine, Lukashenko appears to also be trying to reboot his relations with the West, analysts say.
In recent months, he has pardoned more than 200 people jailed for participating in anti-government protests in 2020, according to Viasna, a Belarusian human rights group in exile. Many analysts see that as a gesture aimed at persuading the West to relax sanctions. The demonstrations were in response to a presidential election largely seen as a sham.
The most prominent leaders of the 2020 protests are still jailed, including Maria Kolesnikova, who became a symbol of resistance to Lukashenko after she tore up her passport to avoid being deported from Belarus.
Belarusian news media have been spinning the pardons, which have been officially announced, although mostly without naming inmates or providing details, as a benevolent act by Lukashenko. The government has not publicly mentioned the link to sanctions. But Yuri Voskresensky, a former lawmaker with ties to the government, has said that Lukashenko would not let Kolesnikova go without significant concessions. “All instigators are likely to be turned down,” he told Belarusian news media last month. He added that Belarus would “make an exception” and consider more pardons, but that “in that case,” the West “should lift all the sanctions.”
Tatyana Khomich, Kolesnikova’s sister, who lives in exile in France, described the recent releases as “both an opportunity and a calculated move by the regime” to improve its image and “seek concessions.”
She urged the West to seize “this rare opportunity,” saying that “the moral imperative to save lives justifies flexible approaches, including the possibility of conditional, limited or temporary relaxation of sanctions.”
The office of Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, an opposition leader who claimed victory against Lukashenko in the disputed 2020 election, cautioned against making concessions. She left Belarus for Lithuania during a violent postelection crackdown, but her husband is among those still in jail in Belarus.
“Let’s not be fooled,” said Franak Viacorka, Tikhanovskaya’s chief of staff. “It’s not a change in policy.”
Sanctions imposed on Belarus over its violations of human rights, he added, should “only be eased if the regime stops its repression and releases political prisoners. We are not there yet.”
The releases come with other caveats. Lukashenko has also arrested an even greater number of people than he has pardoned in the past nearly six months, mainly opposition sympathizers, before an election next month, according to human rights groups. He is all but certain to win that contest because he holds all of the levers of power in Belarus.
While there is no likelihood that Lukashenko will break with President Vladimir Putin of Russia, analysts are watching the prisoner releases closely to see if he is making overtures to the West.
“Repressions in Belarus have been going on nonstop since 2020,” Valery Kavaleuski, a Belarusian opposition figure, said in Washington. “They have become part of that system of governance.”
But, he said, “The string of pardons is a break from the norm.” Lukashenko’s government “is now sending very clear messages to the West,” he added.
Getting the West to ease sanctions is likely to be an uphill battle for Lukashenko, given his repression at home and his support for the war in Ukraine, analysts say.
There is little chance that sanctions on potash, a key ingredient in fertilizer and a major source of foreign currency for Belarus, will be lifted. But Western officials have expressed a readiness to perhaps ease measures against the airline Belavia, the national carrier. Baltic nations, particularly Lithuania, are opposed to any easing of sanctions.
This month, Anitta Hipper, a European Commission spokesperson, noted the release of political prisoners in Belarus, but added that there were still a large number in custody. “We call on their immediate and unconditional release,” she said on the social platform X.
The opposition movement in exile has been divided over whether pressure on Lukashenko should be eased in exchange for the release of prisoners. But opposition leaders and human rights groups have generally welcomed the recent releases as a small positive.
“Last year, we thought we’d need to try and bring about the release of at least one political prisoner,” said Volha A. Harbunova, an activist involved in the 2020 protests who said she was encouraged by the much higher number of people freed. Harbunova was imprisoned in Belarus for six months after the protests and later fled the country.
Viasna has tracked the release of 207 prisoners. The group has also tallied 269 people arrested, but says the number could be higher because arrests are difficult to track.
Artyom Shraibman, a Belarusian scholar at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center, said the prisoner releases appeared to be part of a strategy by Lukashenko “to figure out what could be the minimum price he needs to pay to restore dialogue with the West.”
Belarus has been subject to an escalating series of Western sanctions over the past few years for its crackdowns on dissent, and then for allowing the country to be used as a staging ground for Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Lukashenko “could very much expect that in the event of a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine, the bar for Minsk will be dramatically lower,” he said, “and his concessions will be more appreciated.”
Dmitri Luksha, a journalist who spent 30 months in jail on charges of organizing riots and “discrediting Belarus,” said he was one of those pardoned.
“All I had to do was sign this paper — literally three lines, saying that I am asking for pardon and I promise not to break the law again.”
His wife, who had been arrested along with him, was also pardoned.
Some prisoners were freed after making confessions that rights groups believe were coerced.
In August, Ksenia Lutskina, a former state TV reporter who was serving an eight-year sentence for working with the opposition, said in an interview with Belarusian state TV at a prison colony that she was sorry she “committed a crime against the state.” She apologized to Lukashenko for “joining a plot to seize power” and thanked him for letting her go home to her young son. She had been diagnosed with a brain tumor while serving her sentence.
Human rights groups have voiced concerns about the well-being of opposition figures like Viktor Babariko, who had planned to run against Lukashenko in the 2020 elections but was jailed before election day, and protest leaders like Kolesnikova and Sergei Tikhanovsky, Tikhanovskaya’s husband.
Kolesnikova had been held incommunicado for 20 months until November, when Lukashenko allowed her family to visit. Kolesnikova had emergency surgery in prison and lost weight, according to family members.
Kolesnikova’s father told The Associated Press that his daughter was doing fine and was considering asking for a presidential pardon. The family has since refused to comment.
Lukashenko has twice before issued presidential pardons for high-profile opponents after the European Union rolled back sanctions when he distanced himself from Russia. He later reversed course and moved back into Russia’s orbit.
“Lukashenko has over the years shown his willingness to release his sworn enemies as long as he saw he was getting something worthy in return,” Shraibman said.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
