Nobel laureate Ales Bialiatski describes Belarus prison ordeal

VILNIUS, Lithuania — Nobel Peace Prize laureate Ales Bialiatski arrived for an interview with The Associated Press on Sunday in the Lithuanian capital, Vilnius, direct from a dentist appointment. The 63-year-old veteran human rights advocate — looking pale, visibly tired and emaciated — was experiencing a return to daily life after more than four years behind bars in Belarus. He was suddenly released on Saturday. Medical assistance in the penal colony where he served his 10-year sentence was very limited, he said in his first sit-down interview after release. There was only one option of treating dental problems behind bars — pulling teeth out, he said. Bialiatski recalled how in the early hours of Saturday he was in an overcrowded prison cell in the Penal Colony no. 9 in eastern Belarus when suddenly he was ordered to pack his things. Blindfolded, he was driven somewhere: "They put a blindfold over my eyes. I was looking occasionally where we were headed, but only understood that we're heading toward west." In Vilnius, he hugged his wife for the first time in years. "When I crossed the border, it was as if I emerged from the bottom of the sea and onto the surface of the water. You have lots of air, sun, and back there you were in a completely different situation — under pressure," he told the AP. Bialiatski was one of 123 prisoners released by Belarus in exchange for the U.S. lifting sanctions imposed on the Belarusian potash sector, crucial for the country's economy. A close ally of Russia, Belarus has faced Western isolation and sanctions for years. Its authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko has ruled the nation of 9.5 million with an iron fist for more than three decades, and the country has been repeatedly sanctioned by the West for its crackdown on human rights and for allowing Moscow to use its territory in the 2022 invasion of Ukraine. In an effort at a rapprochement with the West, Belarus has released hundreds of prisoners since July 2024. Arrest, Nobel Peace Prize and the prison ordeal Bialiatski won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2022, while in jail awaiting trial, along with the prominent Russian rights group Memorial and Ukraine's Center for Civil Liberties. His arrest in 2021 came as part of a large-scale crackdown on dissent that Lukashenko had unleashed in response to mass protests that engulfed the country after a 2020 presidential election. That vote handed Lukashenko his sixth term in office and was denounced by the opposition and the West as rigged. Tens of thousands of people were arrested in the aftermath, with many brutally beaten, and hundreds of thousands have fled abroad. Bialiatski was convicted of smuggling and financing actions that violated the public order — charges widely denounced as politically motivated — and sentenced to 10 years in prison. The veteran advocate, who founded Belarus' oldest and most prominent human rights group, Viasna, was imprisoned at a penal colony in Gorki in a facility notorious for beatings and hard labor. He told AP that he wasn't beaten behind bars — his status as a Nobel Peace Prize laureate protected him from physical violence, he said. But he said he went through much of what all political prisoners in Belarus go through: solitary confinement, arbitrary punishment for minor infractions — "for not shaving, for not marching the way you're supposed to, for cleaning poorly" — not being able to see your loved ones, rarely receiving letters. "We can definitely talk about inhumane treatment, about creating conditions that violate your integrity and some kind of human dignity," he said. Just like other political prisoners, Beliatski was designated as having "extremist tendencies" and forced to carry a yellow label in the colony. His wife was barred from visiting him behind bars, and he was often deprived of care packages with medications that were sent to him. "I now need to deal with my health, because during these 4 1/2 years I received minimal medical assistance. You need to understand that medical care in Belarusian prisons is very limited," he said. Crackdown on dissent in Belarus continues Bialiatski is concerned about two of his Viasna colleagues, Marfa Rabkova and Valiantsin Stefanovic, who remain imprisoned, and about all 1,110 political prisoners still behind bars, according to Viasna. "Despite the fact that prisoners are being freed right now, new people regularly end up behind bars. Some kind of schizofrenia is taking place: with one hand, the authorities release Belarusian political prisoners, and with the other they take in more prisoners to trade, to maintain this abnormal situation in Belarus," he said. In the Penal Colony No. 9, where Bialiatski was serving his sentence, some 20 other political prisoners were imprisoned, too, he said: "Workers, students, even one serviceman — very different people, which shows how widespread the desire for democracy and human rights is among the Belarusian people," he said. The advocate vows to continue to fight for the release of all political prisoners, adding: "There is no point in freeing old ones if you're taking in new ones." He intends to use his status as a Nobel Peace Prize laureate — of which he learned in prison and couldn't initially believe it — to help Belarusians "who chose freedom." "This prize was given not to me as a person, but to me as a representative of the Belarusian civil society, of the millions of Belarusians who expressed will and desire for democracy, for freedom, for human rights, for changing this stale situation in Belarus," he told AP. "And it was a signal to the Belarusian authorities, too, that it's time to change something in the life of the Belarusians." Bialiatski intends to keep working with Viasna. The group has relocated to Vilnius from Belarus amid the crackdown, but remained the leading organization in monitoring human rights abuses and helping those facing repressions. Bialiatski admits that the possibilities to do anything within the country "have decreased sharply." "The majority of civil society activists are either in prison, or were forced to emigrate, leave Belarus after prison," he said. "The situation is difficult, but I hope for international solidarity, for the pressure on the Belarusian regime, which has to continue, because the Belarusian authorities hear only these arguments — arguments from a position of strength." Russia's war in Ukraine affects Belarus Having supported Russia's war in Ukraine, the Belarusian authorities now use it as an additional pretext to intensify the crackdown on dissent domestically, Bialiatski says. Belarus has not declared martial law, but it effectively has it in place, he says: "People land in prison for, say, photographs of non-Belarusian military equipment." The Belarusian government has agreed to host Russian tactical nuclear weapons, and the country's political and economical dependence on Moscow makes it a hostage to the Kremlin's plans and expansionist ideas, in which "Belarus was destined for a tragic fate." "It is, of course, very important for Belarus that the war ends. And it is also clear that this end must not come at the expense of Ukraine, because the situation with democracy, human rights, and the development of Belarus depends greatly on how things unfold in Ukraine itself," Bialiatski said. Other released prisoners speak out in Ukraine Four other released dissidents on Sunday spoke to reporters in Ukraine, where the majority of those freed by Belarus — 114 people in total — were taken the day before. They expressed gratitude to Ukraine for taking them in and providing them with assistance at a time when a war was raging. Addressing reporters in the city of Chernihiv, Viktar Babaryka, Maria Kolesnikova, Alexander Feduta and Uladzimir Labkovich echoed Bialiatski's statement and said that they didn't know where they were being taken and only realized that it was Ukraine upon arrival.