Rising Altitudes, Raising Political Stakes: Hybrid Threats as a New Addition in Lukashenka’s Transactional De-Isolation Attempt

Following the two days of negotiations, on December 13, the U.S. represented by the special envoy John Coale managed to reach another interim deal with Belarus’ regime on the release of 123 political prisoners, including a part of very prominent political opponents and activists, Maryia Kalesnikava, Pavel Seviarynets, Viktar Babaryka, and Nobel Prize winner Ales Bialiatski.  In addition to 31 prisoners of Ukrainian origin released a couple weeks prior, in total 219 people were brought out from prisons and out of Belarus as a result of the U.S. rapprochement effort. In exchange, in addition to previously eased Belavia sanctions, the U.S. agreed to lift sanctions on Belarusian potash, the critical industry for the Belarusian economy.

This round of negotiations was taking place in the particularly complex context, which can be characterized as heightened tensions between Belarus’ regime and Lithuania, facing the intensification of hybrid threats in the form of meteorological balloons on the top of orchestrated and weaponised migration. Poland, facing similar weaponised migration, has been persistently seeking the release of Andrzej Poczobut, discussing it via the U.S. Envoy, and sending clear signals, such as opening of two additional border crossings with Belarus. On the parallel track, Belarus’ regime’s less sound than the U.S. engagement attempts targeting individual EU countries in the ice-breaking effort.

While many Belarus’ observers and policymakers may have flashbacks in terms of previous rapprochement attempts with the West, with the recent occurring in 2015-2019, arguably, this post-2020 “cycle” is hardly comparable to any of those before in terms of both fundamentally different and irreversible reasons for the sanctions (unprecedented repression in scale and nature, involvement in Russia’s aggression against Ukraine),  and significantly decreased agency. This new situation forces Lukashenka to play more layered and at the same time less predictable to previous “cycles” transactional game while seeking for de-isolation in Europe and the West.

New Threat in the European Airspace

In 2012, a Swedish agency parachuted hundreds of teddy bears carrying pro-democracy messages in Minsk, illegally and undisrupted crossing Belarus’ airspace. A decade later, Belarus’ regime included air-based hybrid attacks into its arsenal of political pressure. Belarus’ regime, which has orchestrated a migration crisis against its neighbours since 2021, in 2025 intensified the exploitation of cigarette smuggling via meteorological balloons, adding a new type of threat to the list of hybrid threats that Lithuania and EU are facing from the East.

While balloon-based type of smuggling is not a completely new phenomenon and possibly initially originated as a means of “genuine” cigarette smuggling in the context of highly tightened land routes in the last couple years, the hybrid nature of this threat became particularly evident with ramping intensity and simultaneously growing political demands from Minsk. There is a series of traits and effects common for hybrid attacks. According to aviation experts, the balloons are deliberately launched into critical aviation zones at calculated intervals, leading to forced airport closures, disrupting and endangering civil aviation. In addition, this creates supplemental material and non-material damages, including economic losses, harming Lithuania’s attractiveness for investments, facilitating political and information environment favourable for information manipulation and undermining trust in democratic institutions agencies.

Lukashenka’s officials have soundly maintained the narrative that they are not behind this threat, trying both diminish the level of threat in public and shift blame solely to non-state actors, even though attached to balloons thousands of packs of cigarettes are produced at state-owned factories. While Lithuanian border guards are observing how balloons are being launched from the Belarusian territory, Belarus’ regime infamous for its capacity of identifying and repressing citizens that appeared in protests five years ago, pretend being out of sight of what is happening at the heavily observed border area.

Less Visible Economic and More Clear Political Reasoning Behind Balloon Attack

In response to balloons and repeated forced shutdowns of the main country’s airport, with certain exceptions, Lithuanian government has temporarily closed the border. To retaliate, the Belarusian side has banned the movement of Lithuania-registered cargo trucks. Belarusian state media claimed there were 5,000 trucks, while Lithuanian side counted up to eight hundreds. Following the border closure, Minsk reiterated demands of holding political-level negotiations at the Foreign Minister’s level. While Lithuania, which does not recognise Lukashenka as legitimate head of state of Belarus, had not engaged in high-level political talks, the regime has proposed border re-opening as the condition to release the trucks, and soon Lithuanian government, citing the decrease of airport disruptions, re-opened the border prior to the initially envision term. Hours later, the balloons disrupted the airport operations again, trucks did not move and soon Minsk returned to “political-level dialogue” demands, this time at a Vice-Minister level.

While having a sound intention of political gains, initially Lukashenka seemed very dismissive of adding this issue to the talks with U.S. representatives. At the end of October, Lithuanian Ambassador to the U.S. Gediminas Varvuolis met with John Coale, who recently became Trump’s special envoy for Belarus, bringing the balloons issue to the attention. A few days later, Lukashenka publicly responded, to rephrase diplomatically – via a sharp dismissal. That was reiterated in December, when he dismissed involvement of Americans, additionally adding financial demands to the political. However, this initial dismissal appeared to be a facade, as within first minutes of the meeting with Coale in December, Lukashenka hinting “the world is changing very quickly, and new problems are emerging that we must discuss.” Soon after the talks, Coale reported that Lukashenka agreed to stop balloon incursions.

Carrots to the U.S., Sticks for the EU

In addition to adding a one more issue to the negotiation table with the U.S., there are several other possible reasons why the regime is trying to force Lithuania into the political level engagement. First, Lithuania has been consistently hawkish in relation to Belarus’ regime and sanctions regime against it, being one of the soundest voices within the EU and at the same time hosting Belarusian democratic movements and organisations, including the Office of Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya. Therefore, the spectrum of the possible reasons could range from the potential gains in terms of legitimacy internationally and domestically to willingness to shake the EU unity in terms of the sanctions imposed, which objectively have a stronger impact on the regime than U.S.’s given the trade volume and routes, to subjective and not necessarily rational from the European standpoint personal gains.

The existence of talks with the U.S. is already a big change in status quo for the five-years-isolated regime, and any change in the context can be seen as an opportunity. It is highly possible that Minsk sees talks with the U.S. as a possibility to shake the European stance, and since it did not change by inertia as some might have hoped, Minsk is seeking for extra leverages in relation to hawkish Lithuania but also Poland. The “traditional transactional offer” of political prisoners in exchange for easing sanctions is not perceived the same as in 2015 or earlier periods, due to scope and implications of mass repressions but also the role of Lukashenka in the war against Ukraine, as well as activities of Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who was the first candidate since 1994 whose vote count is believed that surpassed Lukashenka’s.

Lithuania, to which dozens of previously released and deported prisoners arrived, this time received only nine prisoners, while the vast majority were directed to Ukraine, against the early rumours spread in the media that political prisoners will be arriving to Poland, also raising reserved hopes for Poczobut release. As later became known from Tsikhanouskaya, the regime made the last-minute change, creating new logistical challenges. Volodymyr Zelenskyy later explained, Lukashenka generally did not want to release the prisoners to any of the EU countries, which supports the hypothesis of Lukashenka further trying to further raise pressure on Europe forcing it to changes of its policy.

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A number of political prisoners, including key figures from many structures, such activists from Bialiatski’s Viasna, and Babaryka’s team, including his son, and still over 1,100 recognised political prisoners remain behind bars. The prospects of Lithuania regaining the safety of its airspace and trucks are yet to be tested following the new but not the first promise from the regime. At the same time, Poland’s hands will remain tied, given the continuing imprisonment of Poczobut despite the colossal diplomatic effort that country puts via all channels, including the U.S.

In this context of heightened stakes and the partial lifting of U.S. sanctions, the “price” set by the regime for the remaining and newly introduced “items on the table” in the form of regional security is likely to exceed what the U.S. alone could offer, unless subjective factors will come into play. The EU’s stance will come under significantly greater pressure, primarily at the initiative of Minsk through a range of multi-layered efforts. These efforts include, but are not limited to, formal and informal diplomatic channels targeting both East and West countries, attempts to seed and exploit divisions within democratic forces, efforts to reshape the democratic opposition through the exploitation of internal weaknesses and controversies, continued repression of the regime’s own citizens, and escalation of hybrid threats toward neighbouring states. Addressing these rising stakes will therefore require EU responses and strategies that are equally complex, cross-sectoral, and aimed at varying layers of potential influence.