Belarus says nearly 9,000 Russian troops will deploy to Ukraine border

Around 9,000 Russian troops will deploy to Belarus’s border with Ukraine, according to the Belarusian minister of defense as Ukraine’s president warns Moscow is trying to pull its ally into the war.

Valery Revenka, the head of the Belarusian international military cooperation department, tweeted on Sunday that Russian troops were beginning to arrive in Belarus, adding, “The total number will be a little less than 9 thousand people.”

Last week, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko announced a joint military task force with Russia would deploy to the border, saying he was “warned through unofficial channels about strikes on Belarus” from Ukraine, without providing evidence.

On Monday, Belarusian Defense Minister Viktor Khrenin said the task force has “begun to deploy and carry out tasks.”

“We are not going to attack anyone. I emphasize once again that the tasks of this grouping are purely defensive,” Khrenin said during a briefing, according to the defense ministry’s Telegram channel.

Belarus was used as a staging ground for Russian troops early in the war, but the nation has not sent its own troops into Ukraine.

Russian troops have faced humiliating setbacks in the war as Ukrainian forces pushed the army out of occupied cities and reclaimed territory in the east.

Russia has resorted to mass strikes on civilian and infrastructure targets, while Russian President Vladimir Putin has also threatened to use nuclear weapons.

Lukashenko, a close Putin ally, said in an NBC News interview last week that Russia does not need to use nuclear weapons but explained it has other weapons it could deploy.

“That’s why you don’t cross red lines,” he said, saying leaders must “move forward” when backed into a corner. “You cannot cross them.”

Putin has not drawn clear red lines, however, saying only that he would be willing to use nukes if Russia is attacked. President Biden has also maintained strategic ambiguity about how the U.S. would respond to a Russian nuclear attack in Ukraine.

Lukashenko last week vowed to join the war against Ukraine if the country touches “a single meter of our territory with their dirty hands.”

Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, an exiled Belarusian opposition leader, said last week that Lukashenko is creating a false narrative around Ukrainian threats.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky asked the Group of Seven (G-7) nations last week for a United Nations mission to deploy to the Belarusian border.

“Russia is trying to directly draw Belarus into this war,” Zelensky told the G-7, per CNN.