Foreign Minister of Belarus Vladimir Makei said Wednesday that ‘not a single Russian troop will remain in the nation after a massive joint manoeuvre by Minsk and Moscow on Ukraine’s border end.
Makei, while addressing media in the capital Minsk said, “Not a single (Russian) soldier or a single unit of military equipment will stay on the territory of Belarus after the drills with Russia.”
He added that the defence ministry and long-time President Alexander Lukashenko had made this clear.
Meanwhile, Russia has made an announcement about an end to the military drills around the borders of Ukraine’s , and even those in the Belarus.
But the West is still under doubt for a possible attack on Ukraine, saying it has yet to see proof of actual de-escalation.
At the same time, NATO has referred to Russia’s drills in Belarus specifically as alarming, adding they further lead to creating a difficult time for European Nations.
Make acknowledges a phone call between Ukraine’s and Belarus’s defence ministers this week as ‘positive’, saying it had helped to ‘relax tensions’ Minsk had told Kyiv that “what is happening on the border does not mean that someone is planning to carry out an aggression.”
“Neither Moscow nor Minsk and nor Kyiv wanted a war, he added.”
Meanwhile, Kyiv had also considered the defence call as a positive sign.
On Wednesday, the Defence Minister of Ukraine said that Kyiv’s military attache had made a visit at the exercises in Belarus the previous day and that the Belarusian attache would be attending drills in the Western region of Ukraine on Wednesday. Belarus, is being ruled by Lukashenko since 1994, which provides borders to both Ukraine & Russia.
After being increasingly isolated after the violent mass protests in 2020, Lukashenko has been dependent on his trusted neighbour Russia for the support.