Putin: We treat Belarus’ security in the same way as we treat ours

Russia treats the security of Belarus in exactly the same way it treats its own security, Russian President Vladimir Putin told the media following the talks with Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko in Minsk on 24 May, BelTA has learned. Vladimir Putin noted that Russia regularly conducts exercises of strategic and non-strategic nuclear deterrent forces. Now, with non-strategic nuclear weapons deployed in Belarus, Belarusian allies are also involved in these trainings. “We treat the security of Belarus in exactly the same way as we do in respect to the security of the Russian Federation. This is a key element of our interaction in this area,” he emphasized. The Russian leader pointed out that Russia fully complies with international nuclear arms commitments. “There is nothing that we have violated here. There is nothing unusual here if we compare it to the NATO activities: the same exercises are held there on a regular basis, involving NATO countries where tactical American nuclear weapons are deployed. They conduct exercises with the involvement of their military personnel, combat airplanes and other hardware,” the president said. “We have everything going on according to the schedule. We are escalating nothing. Everything, however, must run like clockwork here: this is an area where we cannot allow any failures, mistakes or inconsistency,” Vladimir Putin emphasized.