MALORITA DISTRICT, 8 December (BelTA) – State Secretary of the Security Council of Belarus Aleksandr Volfovich met with reporters on 8 December and commented on a recent violation of the Belarusian border by a Ukrainian helicopter, BelTA has learned.
The official said: “We primarily focused on protecting western borders, the borders with Poland and Lithuania. Today our southern neighbor Ukraine is starting to show an unfriendly attitude towards Belarus although Belarusians and Ukrainians have always lived in peace, accord, and like good neighbors. We have common roots and a common past. But Ukrainian leadership may have adopted a policy that is not peace-loving. They look up to the West (or are being dictated to) and try to stage some exercises under the guise of the fight against illegal migration.”
Aleksandr Volfovich pointed out that exercises are supposed to take place in exercise areas. “For some reason Ukrainian leadership decided to stage exercises virtually at the state border under the guise of the fight against illegal migration by deploying military forces, heavy weapons, helicopters and combat aircraft. They probably take their cue from Poles, who fight migrants with water cannons and tear gas. It is good that they haven't resorted to firearms yet. It can lead to a local conflict. We wouldn't like it very much. The recent violation of the state border by a combat helicopter of Ukraine's Armed Forces is a testimony to that. What was it from the point of view of evaluation of the military component? A provocation? Lack of skills or training of the pilots or simply careless and sloppy flying on the part of the pilots? But it is not a good reason for showing off their ‘bravado' in this manner,” the state secretary of the Security Council of Belarus stressed.
Aleksandr Volfovich said: “We don't want such incidents to happen. The Belarusian side gives no reasons for it. We don't deploy troops along the state border either in the west or the south. We don't stage unscheduled exercises. We may have to copy Ukrainian colleagues and stage an exercise near the border, too. What could they reproach us for then? For reciprocal measures? Certainly, we wouldn't want that.”
The official remarked that Belarus has always had normal relations with border service agencies of neighboring countries. “We would like those times to return. We would like interaction between border service agencies to become constructive: mutual respect, trust, information sharing. It will help with matters of security both of Belarus and nations of the neighboring countries,” he is convinced.
Aleksandr Volfovich also expressed concern about long queues at border checkpoints. The queues on the Belarusian side are primarily made up of trucks that travel in transit via Belarus. “We would like this problem to be resolved this year. We don't want trucking companies to be inconvenienced. The Belarusian side is doing everything: we fulfill all the norms and requirements. We've notified the other side more than once that some constructive measures need to be taken. Unfortunately, neither Poland nor Lithuania has responded,” he concluded.
