Russia intends to deploy its new Oreshnik missile system, recently used against Ukraine for the first time, in neighbouring Belarus as a deterrent to the West.
“These complexes will be put into service with the Russian Strategic Missile Forces and, in parallel, we will begin deploying them on the territory of Belarus,” President Vladimir Putin said in Minsk on Friday at talks with Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko.
Putin named the second half of 2025 as the date for the deployment of what he described as a “terrible” weapon.
Russia fired the newly developed medium-range missile at the Ukrainian city of Dnipro in November as a warning and deterrent.
According to Moscow, this was a reaction to the authorization for Ukraine’s use of long-range Western missiles to attack Russian territory.
Lukashenko, whose country borders Ukraine and supported its full-scale invasion by Russia in 2022, also urged Putin to station the new weapon in Belarus.
At the meeting on Friday, the two presidents additionally signed a treaty on mutual security guarantees.
With this, nuclear-armed Russia assured its neighbour of the possible use of its full armoury in the event of an existential attack from outside.
Since the start of the war in Ukraine, Putin has stationed tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus, but control of the warheads remains in Moscow.