President Donald Trump helped secure the release of three inmates held in Belarus, including one U.S. citizen, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed on Feb. 12.
“It speaks to President Trump’s deal-making ability,” Leavitt said during a press briefing at the White House, telling reporters that those freed were on their way home. “It’s a remarkable victory.”
Whether a prisoner exchange was part of the negotiations is currently uncertain, she said.
The State Department and the Belarusian Embassy did not respond to The Epoch Times’ requests for comment by publication time.
Two of the individuals, including the U.S. resident, requested that their names and identifying information be withheld from the public to protect their privacy, according to the press secretary.
Another, Andrey Kuznechyk, a journalist in Belarus working for Radio Liberty, was charged in 2022 with allegedly establishing an extremist group and sentenced to six years in prison after a one-day trial.
The outlet’s president celebrated the news of Kuznechyk’s liberation.
“This is a joyous day for Andrey, his wife, and their two young children,” Stephen Capus, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty president, said in a statement. “After more than three years apart, this family is together again thanks to President Trump.”
He also thanked Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the government of Lithuania for their help in securing Kuznechyk’s release and requested similar actions to free another colleague held in Belarus.
“We remain hopeful that our journalist Ihar Losik will also be released and look to the Trump administration for its continued leadership and guidance,” Capus said.
Another U.S. citizen, Anastassia Nuhfer, was returned home to Texas from a prison in Belarus last month, Rubio announced on Jan. 26.
“Thanks to [President Trump’s] leadership, Belarus just unilaterally released an innocent American ... who was taken under Joe Biden,” Rubio posted on social media platform X. “Peace through strength.”
Details related to Nuhfer’s imprisonment remain unclear, and the State Department has yet to release a statement about the situation.
The new releases come one day after Marc Fogel was returned to the United States after serving about 3 1/2 years in a Russian prison.
Fogel was arrested in August 2021 after he attempted to enter Russia with about a half-ounce of marijuana.
Trump met the schoolteacher at the White House on Feb. 11 after promising Fogel’s 95-year-old mother on the campaign trail that he would bring him home.
In further negotiations in the region, U.S. officials—including Rubio, CIA Director John Ratcliffe, national security adviser Michael Waltz, and special envoy Steve Witkoff—plan to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Munich on Feb. 14 to discuss potential solutions for ending the ongoing war with Russia, Trump announced on Feb. 12.
