MINSK, August 10. /TASS/. Belarus is taking appropriate measures amid steps toward further militarization by Poland and the Baltic states, Belarusian Security Council State Secretary Alexander Volfovich said.

"All of our predictions regarding the activities of NATO and specific member states [of the bloc] have proven to be fully correct. Of course, we are not sitting back, but are taking appropriate response measures," the BelTA news agency quoted Volfovich as saying. He pointed out that while Belarus is engaged in an all-out battle to bring in the harvest, its Western neighbors are striving to ignite another type of battle.

"As you can see, our neighbors are eagerly trying to implement the guiding principles set forth at the recent NATO summit held in Vilnius," said the senior security official. "Moreover, they are doing it even ahead of schedule in order to please their overseas patrons." According to him, "Poland and the Baltic states are taking steps toward militarizing" the situation at their borders with Belarus under cover of fanciful pretexts of some alleged threat from the east. "Warsaw has even expressed its readiness to host American tactical nuclear warheads on its territory. They are procuring advanced weapons," Volfovich noted.

"We are studying in detail [Russia’s] experience of conducting the special military operation in Ukraine. We are practicing modern combat tactics together with instructors from Russia’s Wagner Private Military Company (PMC). And, we’re not hiding it. We are doing this for purely defensive purposes," he pointed out. As the Security Council official specified, this also applies to the deployment of Russian tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus.