Belarus does not have plans for join Russia military transaction in Ukraine, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said on Tuesday, but noted that the country air defense systems have been put on alert to “prevent Russian forces from being hit in the back.”
Lukashenko denies Kyiv claims that Russian troops were attacking Ukraine from Belarusian territory, the Belarusian state news the Belta agency reported.
He also commented on Monday meeting between the Ukrainian and Russian delegations on the Belarusian border and welcomed the result of the peace talks, despite the absence progress having been made, leading to an expected second round of negotiations.
“The negotiators are just great”, Lukashenko said, according to Belta. “They made more that it was possible. They did their job brilliantly in five hours to first scene,” he said.
Despite claims by Belarus that it did not participate in the military aggression in Ukraine, the Ukrainian militarygeneral staff wrote on Facebook, he believed the troops from Belarus were also moving to the country.
“Several units of the Belarusian Armed Forces in most combat-ready formations started to move to the Ukrainian border in the direction of Volhynia,” he wrote.
The port of southern Ukraine of Mariupol was back under Ukrainian control, the state of the country information service said in the beginning hours of Tuesday.
Volhynia is in Northwestern Ukraine, near the border with Belarus.
The Ukrainian state information service also said one attack on southern ukrainian city of Kherson had started.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia carried out 56 rocket attacks on Ukraine since invasion started five days ago, and fired a total of 113 cruise missiles. Russia, on on the other hand, said that the Ukrainian “nationalists” were bombing the cities.
Both Ukrainian and Russian armed forces reportedly suffered casualties when Moscow attacked Sumy region of northeastern Ukraine.
