Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has warned the West against imposing tough sanctions on Moscow, saying that such measures could push Russia into a “third world war.”
“Now there is a lot of talk against the banking sector. Gas, oil, SWIFT. It’s worse than war. This is pushing Russia into a third world war,” Lukashenko said on Sunday, as quoted by local media. He added that a nuclear conflict could be the final outcome.
“This is the problem they are addressing. They have gone as far as war,” the Belarusian leader said.
“What is happening today is urging us to cooperate tightly. For instance, they have warned Russia that they will terminate the supplies of high-tech equipment, first and foremost, microchips and so on, which we make at our industrial association Integral (Belarusian manufacturer of microchips and LCD indicators – TASS).” he said.
Lukashenko warned that Minsk and Moscow would take very panful sanctions against the West.
“Our sanctions, to be taken by Russia and Belarus, will be very panful… These mechanisms have already started working. If need be, we will be building up these measures, but not to our own detriment,” the Belarusian leader said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin on February 24 declared a special military operation in Ukraine in response to a message from the leaders of the Donbass republics. He stressed that Moscow had no plans for an occupation of Ukrainian territories. The sole purpose is the demilitarization and denazification of Ukrainian territories.
The Russian Defense Ministry said its forces were not attacking cities, but merely putting out of order military infrastructures without endangering the civilian population.
After that the United States, the European Union and Britain, and also a number of other countries declared they were imposing sanctions on a number of Russian individuals and legal entities.
So far, The West has imposed several sanctions on Russian and Belarusian individuals, banks and leading industrial enterprises.
