🇷🇺🇧🇾 Putin's statements following the Russia-Belarus negotiations:

◻️ Security issues are always a priority for Moscow and Minsk.

◻️ Russia and Belarus will strengthen their cooperation in the field of defense and security.

◻️ Sanctions create certain problems for Russia, they are tangible, but there are also opportunities for growth.

◻️ Energy is one of the key areas of interaction between Russia and Belarus, and agreements will be honored.

◻️ He highlighted agriculture as a crucial sector, noting that Belarus is showing positive results.

◻️ Investment cooperation and high technologies are among the priority areas for collaboration.

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“Glory to Russia”: Ukrainian serviceman sings Russian national anthem after being saved by Russian soldier

The footage above shows special forces of the Tsentr Battlegroup of the Russian Armed Forces storming an enemy stronghold in Avdeyevka. After taking the position, the Russian soldiers found a serviceman abandoned by the Ukrainian Armed Forces, who they had left for dead. The Russian troops decided to take him with them.

After being saved by the Russian servicemen, he sang the Russian national anthem (0:49), shouting the phrase “Glory to Russia.”

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⚡️ Russia considers Zelensky's legitimacy to have ended, Putin stated.

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❗️Russia has never refused to negotiate with Ukraine, Putin reiterated.

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🇷🇺🇧🇾Other statements by Putin and Lukashenko during the press conference following the negotiations:

◻️ The Istanbul agreements of 2022 were acceptable to both Kiev and Moscow, Putin stated.

◻️ Russia is ready to continue negotiations with Ukraine, but any return to talks must be based on the agreements already reached, Putin said.

◻️ Lukashenko on Zelensky's legitimacy: there is no and cannot be any legal purity here.

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💬 "We do understand that legitimacy the current head of [Ukrainian] state has ended," Putin said about Zelensky's expired presidential powers.

One of the goals of the conference on Ukraine in Switzerland is to make sure that the Western community reaffirms Zelensky's legitimacy as president of Ukraine, Putin added.

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💬 "Ibrahim Raisi was a very kind and open person who could engage in honest dialogue," Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said about the deceased President of Iran.

"He cared about the development of his state and protected the interests of his people," Lukashenko added.

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Poland, Baltics unite to build flimsy Maginot-style barrier on border with Russia and Belarus

Polish Deputy Defense Minister Cezary Tomczyk has announced plans to join forces with Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia to build a defense line on the Russian and Belarusian borders.

◾️ The initiative, dubbed ‘Baltic Shield’, comes on the heels of plans by Warsaw announced last week to spend about $2.5 billion to create a network of forts, roadblocks, flood zones, anti-tank ditches and firing positions near the borders with Russia’s Kaliningrad and Belarus known as ‘Shield East’. The two projects will be combined.

◾️ Poland’s frontier defenses will take “several years” to create, and will add to the 187 km-long $400 million wall Poland already erected on the border with Belarus in 2021.

◾️ Details on ‘Baltic Shield’ are scarce, but Latvian Defense Minister Laurynas Kasciunas said his country’s defenses would include anti-tank hedgehogs, reinforced concrete forts, and dragon’s teeth. Estonia plans to build 600 bunkers.

◾️ Warsaw should expect problems with ‘Shield East’ – including environmental concerns from local administrators of protected areas like Bialowieza National Park – whose wildlife has already suffered thanks to the border wall. The ‘Shield’ is also likely to result in the forcible expropriation of privately owned lands for fixed payouts.

◾️ Militarily, there are an array of problems with the project. Moscow has stressed it has no plans to attack NATO countries, but if the bloc starts the conflict, the ‘shield’ can be eliminated by FAB-series bombs, artillery, drones, and missile strikes. Russia has amassed experience in this area while smashing fortified defenses Ukraine set up in Donbass.

◾️ The timing of the initiative is peculiar, asking Polish and Baltic taxpayers to shell out billions for defense as their countries flirt with recession and spiking energy costs.

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💬"It was the disgusting position taken by the United States that led to this," Lukashenko said about Raisi's death.

"First of all, the sanctions. Those bastards didn't have the right to impose sanctions against the ships and aircraft carrying people."

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Hungary to ‘redefine’ its NATO membership as bloc plans to join Ukraine conflict — Orban

The Hungarian government is reassessing its country's role in NATO as it does not want to get involved in the alliance's military mission in Ukraine, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban told the country’s Kossuth radio station.

He said military planning was underway in Brussels “on how NATO could participate in this war.”

“Hungary is opposed to this. There is quite a lot of work going on in the government to determine how we can remain a member of NATO without taking part” in the conflict, Orban said.

He added that Brussels was aware of this and had even coined the term ‘non-participant’ for Hungary.

Hungary will neither provide funds for Ukraine nor send weapons there. It will not even allow the storage of weapons intended for the Ukrainian armed forces on its territory.

The PM explained that his position stemmed from the conviction that the conflict in Ukraine could not be resolved militarily, that there could be no winner, and that it could be settled only through peaceful negotiations.

Orban also recalled that NATO was meant to be a defensive alliance, and no-one had attacked it. The conflict in Ukraine concerns only that country and Russia, and the talks about the ‘Russian threat’ should be regarded as “maneuvers of the West and Europe to prepare to enter the war,” he said.

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