ANKARA – In a move specific to stoke tensions in war-torn Ukraine and its Western allies, Russia will complete the construction of a particular storage facility for tactical nuclear weapons in neighbouring Belarus.
Russia has already handed over to Belarus the Iskander complex, which can store nuclear weapons, Russian President Vladimir Putin as saying in an interview on TV channel Rossiya-24 yesterday, according to Anadolu Agency.
According to Putin, his Belarusian counterpart Alexander Lukashenko has long raised the issue of deploying Russian tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus, which have not been present there since the early 1990s, when the USSR fell.
“We agreed with Lukashenko that we would place tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus without violating the nonproliferation regime,” Russian news agency TASS quoted Putin as saying.
The United States has long placed such weapons in several countries, so there is nothing unusual in Belarus’ request, Putin added.
Russia will complete the construction of the storage facility for tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus by July 1, and the control of arms will not be transferred to Minsk, Putin added.
Since Russia started the war in neighbouring Ukraine 13 months ago, Western leaders and commentators have raised concerns that Moscow might make the conflict nuclear, often based on statements by the Russian side seen by the West as saying that all options are on the table. – Bernama, March 26, 2023
