Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has freed jailed opposition leader Sergei Tsikhanouski and more than a dozen other political prisoners and journalists in a surprise move brokered by Doland Trump’s special envoy.
The decision to free Tsikhanouski, who has been imprisoned since challenging Lukashenko for the presidency in 2020, follows a meeting on Saturday between the Belarusian leader and Keith Kellogg, Trump’s special envoy for Ukraine.
“It’s hard to describe the joy in my heart,” said Tsikhanouski’s wife, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who stepped in to run for election instead of her husband after he was jailed and helped lead big protests against Lukashenko.