Tensions are mounting on the border between Ukraine and Moscow-allied Belarus, as officers in Kyiv warn of a Russian spring offensive amid ramped-up army assaults from the Kremlin.
In uncommon entry since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine final yr, a CNN staff visited Belarus’s southwest border close to northwest Ukraine, accompanied by state border officers.
Ukraine shares a 1,000-kilometer frontier with Belarus, a rustic that has performed a key function in aiding Russia’s assault.
CNN’s Frederik Pleitgen and his staff had been 100 meters away from the Ukrainian aspect, the place they noticed the Belarusian authorities’s fortification of the border space with barbed wire in a fastidiously orchestrated and tightly managed press tour.
In line with the CNN staff on the bottom, the Ukrainian aspect of the border is closely barricaded with a number of layers of barbed wire and earth mounds to cease anybody from going by means of.
Belarusian officers instructed CNN the border crossing from their aspect within the small city of Dyvin remains to be functioning however that the Ukrainian aspect has closed the crossing.
Kyiv has closed all border crossings to Belarus, besides to sometimes enable entry to Ukrainian refugees who want to return to their house nation, out of concern Belarus might be used for an extra invasion by Russia.
The CNN staff might see a Ukrainian flag on Ukraine’s aspect of the border crossing and a purple and white flag which is related to the Belarusian opposition — a transfer Belarusian authorities known as a “provocation.”
Russia used the territory of Belarus as one in every of its launch pads for the invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Joint army drills during the last yr between Belarus and Russia have contributed to issues that Belarusian troops might be a part of Russia’s forces in Ukraine.
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