Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, claimed that nations who side with Russia in its war against Ukraine will be given nuclear weapons.
Lukashenko has long been a staunch supporter of Putin, most recently lending military support to Moscow in its invasion of Ukraine, a country that Belarus borders to the south. Russian troops were allowed to perform military drills on Belarusian territory and later entered Ukraine from Belarus when the invasion began last February. Though no Belarusian troops are known to have entered the conflict in Ukraine, its support of Russia has caused controversy on the world stage.
During an interview with Russian propagandist, Pavel Zarubin, filmed on Thursday, but released on Sunday on Ukrainska Pravda, Lukashenko claimed that any nations who joined the "Union State" pact between Russia and Belarus would be provided with nuclear weapons, calling the prospect a "unique chance to unite." Russia reportedly possesses around 2,000 working tactical nuclear warheads, and recently opted to move ahead with plans to deploy some into Belarus for the first time since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, according to Reuters.
"If someone is worried... I don't think [President of Kazakhstan] Kassym Tokayev is worried about this, but if something suddenly happens, then no one minds Kazakhstan and other countries having the same close relations as we have with the Russian Federation," Lukashenko told Zarubin. "It's very simple. [Countries] should join the union of Belarus with Russia, and that's it: there will be nuclear weapons for everyone."
Putin has repeatedly been accused of threatening the use of nuclear weapons against Ukraine or ally nations who assist it in pushing back the Russian invasion. The Kremlin has countered, claiming that Russia would only deploy nuclear weapons if its sovereignty was directly threatened, as has been the country's standard nuclear policy over the years.
Experts have said that Russia remains unlikely to use its nuclear arsenal, despite the recent move into Belarus, with the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) writing in March that Putin has made threats "without any intention of following through in order to break Western resolve."
Retired Colonel Hamish de Bretton-Gordon, who previously commanded United Kingdom's and NATO's chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear defense (CBRN) forces, previously told Newsweek that, while the move was an escalation, it was also "a massive strategic error" and the threats from Russia remain "hollow."
"I don't think [Putin's] got any aces left to play," de Bretton-Gordon said.
Newsweek reached out to foreign defense experts via email for comment.
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