Russian president says his country will retaliate against any attack on its ally with all means at its disposal as Poland denies having any territorial ambitions in Belarus.
In televised remarks on Friday, Putin warned that Moscow would use any means at its disposal to protect Belarus, which forms a loose Union State with Russia, against possible attacks.
Putin said there were reports of plans for a Polish-Lithuanian unit to be used for operations in western Ukraine – parts of which in the past belonged to Poland – and ultimately to occupy territory there.
“But as far as Belarus is concerned, it is part of the Union State. Unleashing aggression against Belarus will mean aggression against the Russian Federation,” Putin said at a meeting of the Kremlin’s Security Council.
“We will respond to this with all the means at our disposal.”
“It is well known that they also dream of the Belarusian lands,” he said, also without providing any evidence.
‘Pathetic bore from the Kremlin’
Poland, a NATO member and one of Ukraine’s staunchest allies in its fight against Russia’s invasion, denied any territorial ambitions in Ukraine or Belarus.
“The pathetic bore from the Kremlin is once again repeating lies about Poland and also trying to falsify the truth about the war against Ukraine,” Poland’s deputy minister coordinator of special services, Stanislaw Zaryn, told the state-owned PAP news agency.
“Vladimir Putin is also using historical revisionism again to spread false accusations against Poland.”
In his remarks, Putin argued Poland’s western territories were a “gift” from former Soviet leader Joseph Stalin.
“It was thanks to the Soviet Union, thanks to steps taken by Stalin, that Poland got substantial territories in the West – German land. This is a fact,” Putin said. “Western Polish territories are Stalin’s gift to Poland. Have our friends in Warsaw forgotten about it? We’ll give them a reminder.”
Putin’s comments are a message that “Poland has to be grateful to the Soviet Union, to Russia, and instead they are becoming more of an enemy to Russia,” said Nina Khrushcheva, professor of international affairs at the New School and great-granddaughter of former Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev.
“Also this is a message to the Ukrainians: ‘Please remember that for many years Ukraine and Poland were not great friends, and so now you’re being duped.’ So this is a multilayered propaganda message on the Kremlin’s part,” she told Al Jazeera from Moscow.