![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() There are also fears that Lukashenka may order mobilization in Belarus itself if pressured to do so by Putin. While repressive measures against political opponents are regarded as routine in today’s Belarus, the crackdown would likely intensify significantly if the country plays host to a new Russian invasion force in the coming months. In May, Lukashenka responded to this sabotage campaign by introducing the death penalty for partisan attacks on railways. During the initial stages of the war when Russia used Belarus as a key staging post for the invasion, grassroots Belarusian opposition included cyber-attacks and a group known as the railway partisans who sabotaged the country’s train network to disrupt the transit of Russian troops and military equipment. If Russia does decide to deploy large numbers of troops to Belarus with a view to opening up a new northern front in the invasion of Ukraine, Lukashenka would find himself under enormous pressure to crush any domestic dissent. The next test will be whether Lukashenka officially recognizes Russian attempts to annex Ukraine’s Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia regions. This controversial visit was downplayed by the Belarusian state media but was widely interpreted as the price of Putin’s continued backing. On September 28 he visited Abkhazia, a region of Georgia controlled by the Kremlin and recognized by Russia as an independent state. In public, he has played down his involvement in the conflict and has instead sought to portray himself as a potential peacemaker, telling the Associated Press during a May interview, “I want to stress one more time: I feel like this operation has dragged on.”Īt the same time, Lukashenka remains one of Putin’s most frequent guests and appears obliged to regularly demonstrate his loyalty. In exchange for Moscow’s support, Lukashenka has agreed to abandon his earlier criticism of Russian aggression against Ukraine and has instead become something of a junior partner in Putin’s war.ĭespite this limited room for maneuver, Lukashenka has so far managed to avoid direct involvement in the war and has resisted Kremlin pressure to send the Belarusian army into Ukraine. For the past two years, Lukashenka has depended on the Kremlin for his political survival after Putin intervened in 2020 to save his neighbor when Belarus was rocked by anti-regime protests. This role has not been entirely voluntary. He allowed his country to serve as a gateway for invading Russian troops, and has also permitted Russia to launch air raids and missile strikes against Ukrainian targets from Belarusian territory. Nevertheless, the capture of Kyiv remains central to Putin’s goal of extinguishing Ukrainian statehood.īelarus dictator Alyaksandr Lukashenka has played a supporting role in the attack on Ukraine ever since the weeks preceding the February 24 invasion. Russian troops marched on the Ukrainian capital from Belarus during the first month of the invasion in early 2022 but suffered heavy losses and were forced to retreat. With hundreds of thousands of Russians now being called up for military service, there are growing concerns that Moscow may send a significant portion of these newly mobilized forces to Belarus in order to launch a second assault on Kyiv. Vladimir Putin’s decision to order Russia’s first mobilization since World War II is fueling fears in neighboring Belarus that the country could once again become a focal point for the ongoing invasion of Ukraine. ![]()
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