Belarus on Thursday freed two Catholic priests held on treason charges and recognised as political prisoners by rights groups, state media said, several weeks after President Alexander Lukashenko met with a Vatican official.
Minsk has waged a huge crackdown since the 2020 anti-Lukashenko protests, forcing thousands into exile, with more than 1,200 people in prison.
The Catholic clergy has also been targeted.
The Belta news agency said priests Henrykh Akalatovich and Andrzej Yukhnevich -- serving long sentences -- were pardoned.
It called their release an “act of good will” during a Holy Jubilee Year announced by the Vatican and said it was connected to “intensifying contacts” with the Holy See.
In October, Pope Leo sent his Cardinal Claudio Gugerotti to the reclusive country, where he met with Lukashenko. Many saw the meeting as offering hope to imprisoned clergy.
It is unclear how many priests in Belarus -- both Catholic and Orthodox -- are behind bars.
The Catholic church has faced repressions since 2020 for priests offering refuge to protesters -- with a Minsk cathedral symbolically opening its doors at the time.
Akalatovich, who is 65, spent more than a year in the KGB prison in Minsk before being sentenced to 11 years in a penal colony. He was accused of spying for Poland and the Vatican.
Yukhnevich was arrested in May 2024 and sentenced to 13 years.
The Catholic clergy is often associated with neighbouring Poland. In September, Belarus arrested a Polish Catholic monk, Grzegorz Gawel, for spying.
Warsaw this week re-opened two crossing points with the Moscow-backed country.
Poland had closed one of them in 2023 after Minsk sentenced Polish-Belarusian journalist Andrzej Poczobut to eight years in prison.
Poczobut -- who won the EU’s Sakharov human rights prize last month -- remains behind bars.
Belarus is predominantly Orthodox but Catholics make up some 15 percent of the country.