US and EU to impose joint sanctions unless Belarus frees prisoners

A travel ban on Belarusian top officials is likely to be enforced both by the US and the EU unless President Alexander Lukashenko quickly frees the political prisoners rounded up after elections last month, a senior US official stopping in Brussels on his way to Minsk has said.

"Both the EU and ourselves want to keep our postures on Belarus harmonised. But we're not going to make announcements on the same day," Thomas Melia, a diplomat working on democracy and human rights issues in the...