Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko announced Thursday that his country would be ready to receive "nuclear weapons" in the event of a threat from Westerners, with the increase in tension between the two neighbors Russia and Ukraine.
"If the need arises...we will deploy nuclear weapons, even super nuclear weapons, promising weapons, in defense of our territory," said Lukashenko, an ally of Russia, in comments carried by Belarusian media.
Lukashenko stressed that this may happen if the opponents and enemies of his country take stupid measures, as he described it.
"If there are no threats from unfriendly countries towards Belarus, there will be no need for nuclear weapons for a hundred years," added the president of Belarus, which borders Ukraine to the north.
After the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, Belarus abandoned the nuclear weapons deployed on its territory and agreed to return them to Russia, similar to other Soviet republics, including Ukraine.
The Belarusian constitution stipulated at that time that the country would remain a "nuclear-weapon-free zone", but Lukashenko seeks to replace this article in order to "exclude military aggression from the territory of Belarus." This amendment is scheduled to be put to a popular referendum after 10 days.
Washington has previously expressed concern that this expected constitutional amendment would allow the deployment of Russian nuclear weapons in Belarus.
In a related context, the Russian Defense Ministry announced - today, Thursday - that its forces will start leaving Belarus next Sunday, after the end of maneuvers it has been conducting there for days.