Belarus opposition leader freed after EU summit

(MINSK) - A key opposition figure in Belarus was released Saturday, one day after a European Union summit with ex-Soviet states called for the immediate release of the country's political prisoners.

Dmitry Uss, a failed candidate in the December presidential election won by strongman Alexander Lukashenko, was arrested in an ensuing crackdown following protests against the poll which was widely condemned as fraudulent.

"I think he was released given the state of his health," his mother Sofia said, adding he had been given a presidential pardon.

Uss and other opposition figures were detained after Lukashenko's overwhelming poll victory -- which saw him garnering more than 80 percent of the ballot -- sparked a huge opposition protest in downtown Minsk.

The rally was broken up by the police and many candidates in the presidential election were arrested.

Ties between Belarus and the EU are at a new low amid Lukashenko's crackdown on the opposition and Minsk was only represented at the two-day summit in the Polish capital by its ambassador to Warsaw who later pulled out of the meeting.

At the summit, the EU leaders demanded Lukashenko immediately free and rehabilitate political opponents in detention.

In comments published by the official Belta news agency late on Friday, Lukashenko made no secret of what he thought of the summit, saying the concept of the so-called Eastern Partnership was just "chatter".

"We give too much attention to these European meetings. Some bureaucrat in Brussels who no-one has ever heard of blathers away and we start to tremble," he said.

"Let them blather. We don't need to take any notice of them or react."

He was equally dismissive of the presence at the Warsaw meeting of members of the Belarussian opposition, who he now refers to only as the "fifth column".

"They are not going to get the country, however much it costs me, even if it costs me my blood and life," he said.