Belarus contacted Ukrainian intelligence to offer release of political prisoners via Ukraine, Zelensky says
Minsk has told Kyiv via intelligence channels it was ready to release political prisoners held in Belarus through Ukrainian territory, President Volodymyr Zelensky revealed on Dec. 14.
Zelensky said Ukrainian military intelligence (HUR) chief Kyrylo Budanov informed him Belarus preferred this option over releasing the prisoners via "this or that EU country."
The news comes after Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko's regime released over 100 political prisoners in exchange for the U.S. lifting its sanctions on Belarusian potash.
Of those released, 114 were transferred to Ukraine, including prominent opposition figures Maria Kalesnikava and Viktor Babaryka, a former presidential candidate in the disputed 2020 election, HUR said.
Minsk signalled readiness to release the prisoners via Ukraine if Zelensky supports it, the president said, citing Budanov.
"I said: of course, we support this and are ready to receive them," Zelensky told journalists while en route to peace consultations with European and U.S. officials in Berlin.
"Because the issue of political prisoners is important, and there are both Ukrainian citizens there and, of course, it is necessary to bring back both our own and Belarusian political prisoners."
According to HUR, five of the released 123 prisoners were Ukrainian nationals.
Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, exiled Belarusian opposition leader, said the move of transferring most of the prisoners to Ukraine rather than Lithuania was "unexpected." She said that eight prisoners, including Nobel Peace Prize laureate Ales Bialiatski, were transferred directly to Vilnius, from where Tsikhanouskaya's office operates.
Belarus has been a key ally to Moscow during its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, offering its territory as a launching ground for Russian forces invading Kyiv Oblast in 2022.
