The Foreign Ministry called the presence of nuclear weapons in Belarus indefinite

The presence of Russian tactical nuclear weapons (TNW) on the territory of Belarus is not limited in time, they can be returned to Russia, provided that the United States and NATO abandon the course “to undermine the security and sovereignty of Russia and Belarus.” About this in an interview with TASS told Aleksey Polishchuk, Director of the Second Department of the CIS Countries of the Russian Foreign Ministry.

“As for the possible time frame for the presence of Russian tactical nuclear weapons on the territory of Belarus, the Russian-Belarusian agreements do not imply any restrictions on this. In the current geopolitical situation, the main conditions for the hypothetical return of tactical nuclear weapons to Russia could be the refusal of the United States and NATO to undermine the security and sovereignty of Russia and Belarus,” he said.

Polishchuk added that the withdrawal of Russian nuclear weapons from the territory of Belarus should be preceded by the withdrawal of American weapons from Europe and the complete elimination of the corresponding infrastructure in the region. At the same time, he noted that the deployment of tactical nuclear weapons on the territory of Belarus does not contradict the international legal obligations that Russia has, since the weapon is located on the territory of the Union State, within which a single defense space has been formed.

The first Russian nuclear warheads have already been delivered to the territory of Belarus, declared June 16 at the plenary session SPIEF Russian President Vladimir Putin. At the end of May, Russian and Belarusian defense ministers Sergei Shoigu and Viktor Khrenin signed documents defining the procedure for keeping Russian nuclear weapons in a special storage facility on the territory of the republic. Shoigu cited the activity of NATO’s joint nuclear missions as the reasons for this decision, including the training of pilots of non-nuclear countries of the alliance in the use of American nuclear bombs stored in Europe.

On June 9, Putin said that the deployment of Russian non-strategic nuclear weapons in Belarus would begin after July 7–8, when the preparation of the corresponding facilities was completed.