Russia is occupying Belarus, opposition leader says

Belarus risks losing its independence as Moscow tightens its grip on one of its top allies, exiled Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya said Monday.

Under the regime of President Alexander Lukashenko, who has been in power uninterrupted since 1994, the former Soviet republic helped Moscow launch its full-scale invasion of Ukraine and agreed to host Russian nuclear weapons on its soil.

“Lukashenko is now selling to [the] Kremlin our country piece by piece,” Tsikhanouskaya said at the Copenhagen Democracy Summit, adding that Russia’s “creeping occupation” was felt “in all the spheres: military, culture, economy, media.”

The opposition leader urged the West to prevent the deployment of nuclear weapons in Belarus, which could be completed by July.

“It will change a lot for us, Belarusians,” Tsikhanouskaya said. “In case crazy dictators will push this red button, counterattack will be on Belarus, because this weapon will be launched from our country.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s announcement that Moscow would station nuclear warheads in Belarus is the latest in a series of nuclear threats made by Moscow — which has been hit by military setbacks in Ukraine — since the beginning of the war.

Yet Western officials have cast doubts on whether Putin actually intends to deliver on his announcement, which would be the first time the Kremlin’s nuclear weapons are stationed outside of Russia since the 1990s. Putin, they said, could be using the threat as a distraction to divert from Moscow’s losses on the battlefield in Ukraine.