At beginning of war, Lukashenko called and apologized, offering to strike "Mozyr", -Zelenskyy
Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko called President Zelenskyy at the start of Russia's full-scale invasion and apologized.
He stated this in an interview with the Belarusian publication "Zerkalo", according to Censor.NET.
What is known?
According to Zelenskyy, in the early days of Russia's full-scale invasion, he called Lukashenko.
"In response to my words that they are aggressors and allies (of Russia) and are being drawn into the war because missiles were flying and troops were entering from your territory, he told me on the phone that he did not control the situation and said: 'If you want, you can respond to us, strike Mozyr (an oil refinery in Belarus), the plant.
My team and I discussed this — everyone wanted to respond. But, in my opinion, Putin was just waiting for that — for us to strike at that moment. Then he really wanted the Belarusians to be able to send their troops in from that direction as well. We are not saying that there (in the Belarusian Armed Forces) were large forces or capabilities, but still. We would have to think about how to defend ourselves from that side," the president said.
Also, according to the head of state, Lukashenko "apologized and was very afraid" that there would be retaliation.
Russia is dragging Belarus into war
Zelenskyy believes that Russia dragged Belarus into the war for one reason only.
"When they were putting pressure on us in the east and that was where their troops were mainly concentrated, they wanted to stretch our forces along the front line. One of the ideas was to have the Belarusians enter (the territory of Ukraine) with some kind of military force to scare us. In this case, we would certainly have to respond and transfer some of our troops. And that would weaken the east," he explained.
