Release of Political Prisoners in Belarus

International Memorial Association “Memorial” welcomes the release on 13 December 2025 of 123 political prisoners in Belarus, including our fellow Nobel Peace Prize laureate Ales Bialiatski, as well as other human rights defenders and protest leaders. We congratulate our Belarusian colleagues and friends, their families, and the entire human rights community that has worked for many years to secure their freedom. This is an important result of sustained solidarity and international pressure.

At the same time, we cannot forget that more than a thousand political prisoners remain in Belarusian prisons and penal colonies, and that the release of some of them has become a subject of political bargaining and a deal tied to the lifting of sanctions. People unlawfully deprived of their liberty cannot be used as “bargaining chips” in negotiations. We stress that the only genuine step toward law and justice is the release of all prisoners of conscience and an end to the very practice of repression.

We also hope that freedom will come to Ukrainian civilian hostages and prisoners of war held in Russia and in the occupied territories, as well as to Russian political prisoners. This is why the People First campaign, launched with the participation of Memorial and Ukraine’s Center for Civil Liberties, remains so important.

Board of the International Memorial Association, December 21, 2025