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Belarusian border guards intercept Ukrainian drone in Brest region

The Pinsk border detachment stopped the Ukrainian drone with an electronic gun

MINSK, February 9. /TASS/. Belarusian border guards have intercepted a Ukrainian spy drone near the state border in the Brest Region.

"The incident occurred near the state border in the Stolin district on February 8. Belarusian border guards spotted a drone moving from Ukraine into the Belarusian territory," the State Border Committee said on Thursday. "The quadcopter was equipped with a built-in video camera. The content retrieved from the memory chip confirms that the drone was launched from the territory of Ukraine for spying and making photographs of border protection equipment on the territory of Belarus."

The Pinsk border detachment stopped the Ukrainian drone with an electronic gun. This is the first Ukrainian drone to have been intercepted in 2023. In the autumn and early winter of last year, the State Border Committee periodically reported similar cases. On December 1, a UAV was forced to land after crossing the border over the checkpoint Mokrany-Domanovo in the Brest region. On November 16, a spy drone was shot down in the Brest region after intruding into Belarusian airspace from Ukrainian territory. And on November 2, a drone flying from Ukraine was intercepted and forced to land in the Gomel region. It had been used for training in dropping explosive devices.

At the end of January, President Alexander Lukashenko approved decisions on protecting the state border in 2023. The main efforts will be focused on the Ukrainian border. According to the State Border Committee, as of the beginning of the year, Ukraine has massed up a group of 17,200 military personnel in the area of the Belarusian border. Also, Kiev continues to create engineering fortifications and obstacles, including minefields. Bridges are being blown up. Ukraine regularly commits provocations along the border, with weapons used in some cases. In 2022, there were 88 such incidents. Earlier, the State Border Committee said that border patrols had been reinforced and technical security means employed on a wider scale. Ukraine and Belarus share a 1,084-kilometer-long border.

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