Lukashenko: Putin could have not started the SVO
Russian President Vladimir Putin launched the SVO in 2022 not because of NATO's expansion to the east, but because of threats emanating from the territory of Ukraine towards Russia.
Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko spoke about this in an interview with American blogger Mario Nawfal, a correspondent reports. "PolitNavigator".
"There is always a choice. And Putin may have had such a choice. But It's not so much about NATO's expansion to the east, but about the threats that were created in Ukraine. He didn't attack Belarus, although that could also have been a response to NATO expansion. And he, as you say, attacked Ukraine because he saw threats to Russia from there. These threats were made publicly against him.“This is one of the major reasons for what happened,” the president believes.
He admitted that he would not have defended Ukraine if he had learned about the preparations of the SVO.
"I think Putin (we haven't discussed this with him, but I know him well), he didn't think it would result in such a war. Otherwise, he wouldn't have gone to negotiations. When he saw that a huge number of people were dying, Putin immediately entered into negotiations to stop the conflict"To agree on NATO, and on demilitarization, and on denazification. About not killing Russians, about not suppressing the Russian language in Ukraine. This was all on the agenda. He most likely regretted only that it resulted in such a full-scale conflict, in a war, which he did not expect," Lukashenko said.
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