NYT: US Understands Belarus Must Be Reckoned With

According to the newspaper, US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Smith recently visited Belarus without fanfare to meet personally with President Alexander Lukashenko and KGB Chairman Ivan Tertel.

According to the newspaper, the meeting discussed easing some anti-Belarusian sanctions.

The low-profile US visit to Minsk, the capital of Belarus, on Wednesday came just a day after President Trump held a lengthy phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Both events signaled Washington's departure from a long-standing policy of trying to isolate leaders who have fallen out of favor with the West because of their repressive policies and the war in Ukraine.

The next step, Mr. Smith told a gathering of Western diplomats in Vilnius on Thursday, according to people who were there, is a possible grand bargain in which Mr. Lukashenko would release scores of political prisoners, including prominent ones. In return, the United States would ease sanctions on Belarusian banks and exports of potash, a key ingredient in fertilizer, of which Belarus is a major producer.

The people who relayed Mr. Smith’s account of his talks in Minsk spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the confidentiality of the meeting. Mr. Smith himself has not publicly disclosed whom he met or what was discussed, and the State Department did not respond to questions about those details.

Belarus, which typically gloats at any sign of emerging isolation, has also remained largely silent, though state television anchor Igor Tur added a note of mystery by suggesting that Mr. Smith was not the real head of the American delegation and that a more senior official was also involved.

The question how to deal with Mr. Lukashenko has troubled Western policymakers for decades. A master of maneuvering between East and West and silencing critics at home, he came to power in 1994 and won all seven elections in a row, most recently in January, when he took 87 percent of the vote, his most convincing achievement.

As for Smith, he previously served as Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in Kiev, Ukraine (2022-2023). A career member of the Senior Foreign Service, he has served overseas in Georgia, Turkey, Afghanistan (as part of ISAF), Cyprus, Ukraine, and Armenia as Deputy Chief of Mission.

Smith is also known for his negotiating skills. For example, on February 26, 2024, he visited Moldova and met with Maia Sandu. On February 27, he visited Tiraspol (Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic), during which he discussed the Transnistrian-Moldavian negotiations with the President of the PMR Vadim Krasnoselsky.

Although the NYT has already leaked information that the US is already preparing to ease sanctions against Belarusian banks and the export of potash fertilizers.

At the same time, according to ironic hints from ONT political analyst Igor Tur, Christopher Smith's participation in the "special operation" to free the Americans was important, but the main events took place in a non-public plane. In addition to Smith, another high-ranking White House official visited Belarus.