Russia's Oreshnik system in Belarus aimed at West, not Ukraine — diplomat

Diplomat Roman Bezsmertnyi expressed this option on Espreso TV.

"According to Ukrainian and European intelligence data, there are only about ten such systems that were used against Dnipro and Lviv. To say that Belarus has an entire arsenal somewhere on the border would clearly be an exaggeration of the number of systems deployed on Belarusian territory. Moreover, it's located literally 40 km from the Russian-Belarusian border - a former airbase. I wouldn't take responsibility for saying that some unit has taken up combat duty there, as is being reported in the media," Roman Bezsmertnyi noted.

According to him, if this system is indeed on Belarusian territory, it will not be used against Ukraine, because its flight range has both minimum and maximum distances. Accordingly, there are no technical capabilities to use this system against Ukraine from Belarusian territory.

"And this means - if these systems are deployed in Belarus, their purpose is to attack Europe and the U.S. You can see this commotion around Greenland, generated by Russia and China, including through the fact of deploying the Oreshnik missile system on Belarusian territory. Although I would seriously question the fact of this system's deployment in Belarus. Now there's a lot of talk about it, and satellite images from the airbase are shown, but I wouldn't be as certain as Lukashenko and his circle claim. Regarding the probability of using Oreshnik from Belarusian territory, the technical specifications don't allow for this possibility. But the signal with certain saber-rattling for Europe and the U.S. is obvious here," the diplomat concluded.

• On December 17, Russian dictator Vladimir Putin stated that the Oreshnik missile system would be put on combat duty by the end of 2025.

• Already on December 18, self-proclaimed president Alexander Lukashenko announced that the intercontinental ballistic missile Oreshnik is already in Belarus and has begun combat duty.