Well-known Belarusian human rights activist Ales Belyatsky was released on Saturday nearly two years before serving out a prison term imposed on him on a charge of income concealment.
Belyatsky's wife, Natalya Pinchuk, told Interfax he had phoned her on Saturday and said he would be in Minsk in three hours' time.
Belyatsky was sentenced in November 2011 to four and a half years in a high-security prison and confiscation of property, some of which was registered in the name of other people. He was also ordered to pay 721 million Belarusian rubles as reimbursement for alleged damages and 36 million Belarusian rules as state duty.
In September 2012, the Supreme Court threw out an appeal from him against the sentence.
