Belarus Claims It Prevented Drone Attacks from Lithuania. Vilnius Rejects the Allegations

- Belarus Claims It Prevented Drone Attacks from Lithuania. Vilnius Rejects the Allegations
by YURAS KARMANAU, https://apnews.com/
TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — A top security official in Belarus claimed Thursday that the country has prevented attempted drone strikes from Lithuania targeting the Belarusian capital and surrounding areas. Lithuania denied the claim.
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Ivan Tertel, head of the Belarusian Committee for State Security (KGB). told a session of the All-Belarusian People’s Assembly that his and other agencies recently carried out security operations “which made it possible to prevent attacks by combat drones from the territory of Lithuania on objects in Minsk and its suburbs.”
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He did not present evidence for the claim or give any details. He also said that “radicals” in Lithuania and Poland are producing drones to attack Belarus. The All-Belarusian People’s Assembly includes officials, members of local councils, unions and pro-government activists and operates in parallel with the parliament.
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Lithuanian military spokesman Gintautas Ciunis told journalists later Thursday that Tertel’s claims were not true. “This is nonsense; I can’t find another word,” Ciunis said. The Lithuanian crisis management center said in a statement that the comments appeared aimed at a domestic audience in Belarus. It also say they could “be regarded as a continuous hostile provocation and an informational attack against Lithuania, which has nothing to do with reality.”
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Belarus is a close ally of Russia, which has deployed tactical nuclear weapons, missiles and troops in the country. Authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko has repeatedly boasted that Belarus would turn back any attempt by Ukraine of NATO countries to attack it.
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