Putin to Station Nuclear Weapons in Belarus for First Time in Decades

Russian President Vladimir Putin is stationing nuclear weapons in Belarus for the first time in decades.

The Russian leader announced the move to place tactical nuclear weapons in the neighboring Eastern European country on Saturday in response to the United Kingdom providing Ukraine with armor-piercing rounds containing depleted uranium, according to the Associated Press. Putin has falsely accused the U.K. of providing Ukraine weapons "with a nuclear opponent."

The decision to place tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus comes more than a year after Putin announced his invasion of Ukraine, which has previously sparked concern over the potential for escalation into a wider conflict, including the use of nuclear weapons.

"I would like to highlight that, without breaking our international commitments on not spreading nuclear weapons, we already helped our Belarus colleagues to re-equip their planes. Planes of Belarus Air Forces. Ten planes are ready for using this type of weapon," Putin said during a broadcast on Saturday. "We already transferred to Belarus our well known and very effective Iskander complex, and it can also be a carrier."

As Putin's war has faced widespread condemnation, Belarus has emerged as a key ally for Russia. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has publicly supported Putin, even allowing Russian troops to enter Ukraine from the Belarus-Ukraine border, providing closer access to the capital city of Kyiv.

Putin said that Lukashenko has previously suggested placing nuclear weapons in Belarus, while also accusing the United States of "doing this" for decades, according to Reuters on Saturday.

"They [the U.S.] have long deployed their tactical nuclear weapons on the territory of their allied countries," the Russian leader added.

The move sparked condemnation from anti-nuclear advocates, who have long criticized Russia's stance on nuclear weapons.

"As long as President Putin has nuclear weapons, Europe cannot be safe. He justifies this dangerous escalation by citing decades of NATO nuclear sharing," Daniel Hoegsta, the interim executive director of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), said in a statement to Newsweek on Saturday.

Hoegstra continued: "As long as countries continue their complicity in considering nuclear weapons as anything other than a global problem, this helps give Putin cover to get away with this kind of behavior."

Belarusian oppositionist leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya wrote on Twitter that placing Russian nuclear weapons within Belarus' borders "violates the Constitution of Belarus and grossly contradicts the will of the Belarusian people."

"We urge the international community to demand from Russia to stop this threatening deployment and impose adequate and severe sanctions on the regimes of Lukashenka and Putin as outright threats to international peace and security," she tweeted.

Putin's announcement marks the first time since the 1990s that Russia will place nuclear weapons in the neighboring country, according to Reuters.

Meanwhile, former U.S. ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul warned the development is "not good" in a Twitter post Saturday afternoon.

Newsweek reached out to the State Department for comment.

Update 3/25/2023, 5:05 p.m. ET: This article has been updated with additional information.