Immigration Ministry will maintain fast-tracked program for Ukrainians and special cases, but says it wants to focus on absorbing the massive wave of people who arrived last year

Maya Reiten, who was jailed over medical marijuana in her bag, says she lost track of time until seeing Hannukah festivities on TV: 'Each day I drew the candle...and blessed it'

Maya Reiten was held over 2.5 grams of medical marijuana; president, foreign and finance ministers personally appealed for her release

Maya Rayten-Stol, who was caught with 2.5 grams of medical marijuana at Minsk airport, says she's in excruciating pain and facing tough conditions at Pishchalauski Castle prison

Lawyer Maya Rayten-Stol was arrested in Minsk airport 3 weeks ago; Foreign Ministry says Israeli ambassador visited her in jail

Foreign Ministry says it has summoned Belarusian chargé d'affaires to express anger over comments by Alexander Lukashenko at World War Two memorial

Israeli president apparently one of few Western leaders to send letter to Lukashenko, who ordered major crackdown after election seen as rigged, arrested dissident journalist

Shmuel Yefimovich Plavnik, better known by his pen name Zmitrok Byaduli, died in Khazakstan in 1941; his remains were repatriated to Belarus 79 years later