Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko does not have the final say on whether Russian troops can use his territory amid the Russia-Ukraine war, Estonian official Martti Magnus said on Friday.
Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine in late February, with the Kremlin saying the invasion was aimed at “liberating” the separatist Donbass region and removing Nazis from the Ukrainian government, even though Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is Jewish. The invasion was met with widespread condemnation from many world leaders, who expressed concern about the lack of substantial justification for the invasion and reports of war crimes.
However, Russian President Vladimir Putin found a key ally in Lukashenko, who has long maintained close ties with the Kremlin. Belarus shares a border with Ukraine and Russia and sided with Moscow during the conflict. During the invasion, Lukashenko allowed Putin’s military to use his country’s territory to wage war – and last month Russian troops fired missiles into Ukraine from Belarus.
Estonian military official Martti Mangus said on Friday that Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko does not have the final say on whether Russian troops can use Belarus for their invasion of Ukraine. Above, Lukashenko speaks during an interview in Minsk on July 21. ALEXANDER NEMENOV/AFP via Getty Images
Magnus, who is the director of Estonia’s defense preparedness department, told a news conference that the latest attacks show that Lukashenko does not have the final say on whether to allow Russia to use his territory for the invasion.
“The events of July showed that the invading forces were also taking advantage [Kremlin ally] Belarus and delivering both indirect and precision strikes on Ukraine from that side,” Magnus said. “This shows us that [Belarusian leader Alexander] Lukashenko does not have the last word and that Russia’s armed forces can pass through Belarus quite freely.”
His remarks come less than a week after the UK Ministry of Defense said Lukashenko was more dependent on Russia amid the invasion and that he “continues to toe Moscow’s line”.
“His regime has become even more authoritarian with the expansion of the death penalty for ‘preparing acts of terrorism,'” the ministry wrote in an intelligence update last Sunday. “His increasing and baseless accusations of Western agendas regarding Belarus and Ukraine probably indicate that he has become almost entirely dependent on Russia.
Belarus is a key ally of Putin amid the war in Ukraine
As Putin becomes something of a pariah among European leaders, Lukashenko still remains close to him. Russia’s latest missile attack from Belarus is just the latest case of Belarus helping the Kremlin.
In the early days of the invasion, as Russian troops sought a larger invasion, Lukashenko allowed Russian troops to cross into Ukraine from Belarus, giving them closer access to the key capital, Kyiv – although Russian forces ultimately failed to achieved few, if any, targets outside the easternmost parts of Ukraine.
In June, as his troops continued to fight in Ukraine, Putin promised that he would provide Belarus with missiles capable of carrying nuclear weapons.
Lukashenko, meanwhile, has largely backed Putin’s defense of the war. In May, he warned that the West must stop providing weapons to Ukraine to prevent a third world war, and said last month that the West was planning to attack Russia. However, he called on both sides to reach an agreement to end the war.
Newsweek has reached out to the Belarusian Ministry of Foreign Affairs for comment.
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