A day after a Russian air base in occupied Crimea came under a devastating attack, mysterious explosions hit a military airfield used by Moscow for actions in Ukraine in neighboring Belarus.
The dictatorship led by Aleksandr Lukachenko, who after having his regime questioned by massive protests in 2020 entered the Kremlin’s political orbit, has allowed the use of its territory by Vladimir Putin’s forces since the beginning of the invasion in February.
At no time so far have Belarusian forces or equipment been seen in action in its southern neighbor. Even Moscow’s military activity has ebbed considerably in recent months, in what is seen as a signal to the West: Belarus has serious disputes with Poland and Lithuania, members of NATO (Western military alliance), and not being in the war indicates some restraint to neighbors.
The explosions were heard at 23:00 (17:00 GMT) on Wednesday (10) in Ziabrovka, in southeastern Belarus. The place is just 15 km from the Ukrainian border. According to the state agency Belta, the Defense Ministry said there was an accident with no injuries during the test of an engine.
It may be, but the statement follows Moscow’s protocol for denying the seriousness of actions against its territory. On Tuesday (9), the Saki air base was the object of large explosions that Russia attributed to an ammunition accident.
But comparative satellite imagery, released the next day, showed that perhaps half of the estimated fleet of Su-30 fighter jets and Su-24 bombers at the site had been quite surgically destroyed. This can only be explained by the use of Western weapons that Kiev does not admit to having or the action of saboteurs.
Thus, the incident in Belarus suggests that Volodymyr Zelensky’s government is even willing to make public provocations about Russian capabilities as it announces preparations for an offensive to retake areas lost to Moscow in the south of the country.
It is a trap for Putin, who cannot admit vulnerability on Russian soil, even if he has been annexed since 2014 in an internationally unrecognized way, or from his main ally in Europe. Kiev, which does not officially admit the actions, joked on Twitter.
“The epidemic of technical accidents at military airports in Crimea and Belarus should be regarded by Russian forces as a wake-up call: forget Ukraine, take off your uniform and go. Karma finds you everywhere,” he wrote the presidential advisor Mikhailo podoliak.
Ziabrovka, according to Kiev intelligence, is an Iskander-M ballistic missile base and would be protected by advanced S-400 anti-aircraft systems.
The Ukrainian counteroffensive is designed against the Kherson region and also in Zaporijia, the province that houses the homonymous nuclear power plant, the largest in operation in European territory. New explosions involving the complex, occupied by the Russians since March, generated great concern this Thursday (11).
Both sides accused each other: Russians say Ukrainians fired at the plant and vice versa. Of course, the concerns are of a nuclear accident in the country that experienced the tragedy at the Chernobyl plant in 1986, when Ukraine was still part of the Soviet Union.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres urged rival forces to stop fighting in the region: an explosion in a nuclear material deposit or, worse, a reactor, would be catastrophic and would cross national borders.
The US followed suit, calling for the creation of a demilitarized zone around the site. Russia won’t buy it: work on the electrical grid suggests that the country wants to connect the plant to a transmission line to Crimea, guaranteeing energy independence for the peninsula.
