Earlier last week the Liberia sanctions program was terminated after the president signed into order the Termination of Emergency with Respect to the Actions and Policies of Former Liberian President Charles Taylor. The Order stated that the situations which had given rise to the declaration of the national emergency in Executive Order 13348 would be revoked because Liberia had made “significant advances to promote the democracy and the orderly development of its political, administrative, and economic institutions.”

The end of the Liberia program, has only spurred on speculation as to whether the Belarus sanctions program may be next. The Belarus sanctions program was created by Executive Order 13405 which determined that failings in Belarus’s electoral process as well as it’s human rights record called for a national emergency and warranted the sanctions program pursuant to the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). But conjecture that the program may end began last month when the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) issued a General License No. 2 which allowed for transactions with a number of entities that were previously listed. The General License which expires on April 30, 2016 was issued the same day that the European Union announced it would suspend the Belarus sanctions program for four months. The actions come after the October election of Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko who has been in office since 1994. Belarus took a leap forward in October by allowing international observers from the OSCE to monitor the elections. And then took an even larger leap by freeing a number of political prisoners. The EU has stated that it will continue to monitor the democracy and human rights situation in Belarus with the possibility of completely lifting the sanction program on the nation.

Minsk has made great strides in the past couple of years by allowing visits from OSCE Representative on the Freedom of Media, freeing prisoners and allowing the registration of opposition papers which have previously been barred from registering. Yet, not everything is puppies and rose. Many of those who have been freed from prison have been under close surveillance and human rights advocates have been the subject of harassment. One such example includes Elena Tonkacheva, a top human rights lawyer who was expelled from the country last year for speeding. Moreover, there have been rumors that the 20 year term president has been grooming his youngest son Nikolai, whom is rarely seen without, to become his successor.

So that is all to say that although the sanctions on Liberia were recently lifted, it is not necessarily a trend we should become accustomed to. Whether the sanctions on Belarus will be fully lifted will depend on whether the nation will be able to develop a fair democratic process and a commitment towards human rights as was established by the termination of the Liberia sanctions. The country has recently found itself in a dire financial state and would benefit greatly from the lifting of sanctions and investment from outside nations. Therefore movement more a more stable democracy would would not only be beneficial to the people of Belarus but to its economy as well.