Belarus President Lukashenko Accuses West Of Seeking Conflict With Russia And Provoking Ukraine War

Ukraine war must end to prevent nuclear ‘abyss’, Lukashenko

Via Yahoo News

Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko Thursday said Russia, Ukraine and the West must agree to halt the Ukraine conflict to avoid the “abyss of nuclear war” and insisted Kyiv should accept Moscow’s demands.

Lukashenko accused the West of seeking a conflict with Russia and of provoking the Ukraine war.

“You have fomented the war and are continuing it,” he said.

“We must stop, reach an agreement, end this mess, operation and war in Ukraine,” Lukashenko, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s top ally, told AFP in an exclusive interview in Minsk.

“There’s no need to go further. Further lies the abyss of nuclear war. There’s no need to go there,” he said, speaking on the 148th day of Moscow’s offensive in Ukraine.

“If Russia had not got ahead of you, members of NATO, you would have organised and struck a blow against it,” he said, echoing Putin.

Lukashenko said that Ukraine must accept the loss of territory occupied by Russia in eastern and southern Ukraine.

On Wednesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that peace talks with Ukraine “make no sense”, and announced that Moscow’s military aims in the pro-Western country were no longer focused “only” on the east.

Lukashenko insisted that the war could have been avoided if Western countries had given Putin “the security guarantees” he wanted.

“You, members of NATO and Americans, needed war.”