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Minsk reserves right for preemptive strategic deterrence measures — Defense Ministry

Belarus will protect its national interests with use of all available means, Valery Revenko says

MINSK, October 17. /TASS/. Belarus reserves its right to take preemptive strategic deterrence measures amid the establishment of offensive NATO groups near Belarusian borders, says Valery Revenko, head of the Belarusian Defense Ministry international military cooperation department.

"The Republic of Belarus will protect its national interests with use of all available means, including by use of forces, and retains its right to take a complex of preemptive strategic measure complex in order to prevent an attack or to neutralize an internal armed conflict," he said during a briefing for foreign military attaches, partially published by Defense Ministry press office Monday.

Revenko underscored that Minsk is concerned by the "growing Polish military potential," and the practicing of "establishment of offensive groups and use of forces on Russian and Belarusian directions" in the Baltic states.

"NATO tactical battalion groups in Lithuania and Latvia are being gradually transformed into brigades, and can in future be brought to division levels," the military official said.

He also pointed out that Belarusian security agencies discovered plans to transport "up to 300 militants" from Ukraine "in order to capture a district center and prepare a foothold for a further offensive operation."

In mid-August, Belarusian Defense Minister Viktor Khrenin said, commenting on the West’s training of nationalist militias outside of Belarus for further offensive or initiation of an internal armed conflict in the republic, that Minsk will "localize this military threat with all available forces and means, including preemptive measures.".

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