Who Andrzej Poczobut Is and Why Belarus Released Him
When Andrzej Poczobut crossed from Belarus into Poland last Tuesday, he barely resembled the broad-shouldered, sharply dressed journalist familiar to Polish readers just five years earlier.
Images that swiftly spread from the border crossing in eastern Poland showed a hollowed, gaunt man with a shaved head.
Five years in cold, concrete prison cells — including six months in solitary confinement last year — had left him looking far older than 53.
His freedom, secured as part of a 10-person prisoner exchange, came after months…