Strengthening the state border, increasing the number of border troops, and even creating a real borders with Russia. Last week, when visiting border detachments, the Belarusian leader made loud statements.
“Military confrontation is in progress on almost all continents, power struggle is being waged, including directly near the borders of Belarus,” Lukashenka said.
Alyaksandr Lukashenka had been more specific about the ‘confrontation’ a day before, during a visit to the Dzivin border guard station in Kobryn district. He complained about Poland’s armaments plans and Ukraine’s unpredictable situation, but it was Russia which became the target of his harsh criticism.
“But we shouldn’t act like Russians. They don’t know what they want and what they are doing at the Belarusian-Russian border. They should make up their minds. Once they have, we can easily respond. We are ready to give an adequate answer at any time. If they want to close the border, they may go ahead. If they close the border, we should introduce border control, too,” stressed the Belarusian leader.
Minsk may create a real border in the Russian direction in response to the Kremlin’s deploying border units in the vicinity of Belarus. Alyaksandr Lukashenka did not rule out that thousands of soldiers might be placed at the service of border troops.
“We may have to consider reducing the army personnel by 2,000-3,000 people while leaving this number [to the border service]. So that there could be 5-10 of these people at every border guard station. Not as redundant personnel but people free to serve as some reserve,” he said.
According to indepent experts, such increase is indicative of pursuing a specific aim.
“This is likely to be due to the fact that the number and size of areas they patrol will grow. And at the moment, we are not guarding only only the border with Russia,” military expert Andrey Parotnikau said.
The Belarusian leader has recently called the Belarusian-Russian border ‘the most weird in Europe’. There had been no border control for two decades. However, in the autumn of 2016, the Russian side prohibited the citizens of third countries from crossing. Moscow began to develop the border infrastructure. As a result of the termination of transit traffic, Belarus is taking losses.
In general, borders are obstacles to trade and labour migration, but the experts believe that the reintroduction of border control with Russia could be economically justified.
In addition, both Moscow and Minsk seems to be ready for such a step, which was undreamt-of several years ago.
Alyaksandr Papko, belsat.eu
