Belarus State TV Declares 'Nuclear State,' Threatens Two NATO Countries

Ryhor Azaronak, a Belarusian propagandist, boasted on national television that his country is now a "nuclear state," as he threatened to attack neighboring Poland and Lithuania.

In a video shared on Twitter by the creator of War Translated, an independent project that translates content related to the war in Ukraine into English, Azaronak can be heard gloating about the power Belarus will have as a state armed with nuclear weapons.

Russian President Vladimir Putin last week announced that his country would station tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus, saying that the move would not violate nuclear non-proliferation agreements. The U.S. said it didn't believe that Putin's announcement meant that Moscow was prepared to use nuclear weapons.

"We have not seen any reason to adjust our own strategic nuclear posture," the U.S. Defense Department said in a statement.

The stationing of Russian nuclear weapons in Belarus, however, could mean that the country, led by Putin's ally Alexander Lukashenko, will get more involved in Russia's war in Ukraine. Belarus, which initially denied any involvement in the war, allowed Russia to stage part of the invasion from its territory and has had Russian missile launchers stationed within its borders.

Belarus shares borders with Ukraine, Poland, Lithuania and Latvia.

"Belarus is a nuclear state! A state that is capable, in case of an attack on its territory, to respond with tactical nuclear weapons," said Azaronak, who is considered to be one of the country's most vocal Lukashenko's propagandists.

"Warsaw will melt and Vilnius will drown. We will watch the sunset and rise of a plague mushroom over the Polish bog. This will happen," he continued, adding that Belarus had been forced by Poland and Lithuania to act this way. "You forced us, so don't complain now, you've been warned!"

It's not the first time that Azaronak has attacked Poland and Lithuania on Belarusian national television, though it's the first time that he has done so using the threat of a nuclear attack.

In November 2021, before the war in Ukraine, Azaronak threatened Poland and Lithuania with war on prime time television, using "multiple racial slurs," according to Live Universal Awareness Map or Liveuamap, an independent global news information website created by two Ukrainian software engineers.

In a video shared on Twitter, Azaronak can be heard threatening Poland and Lithuania with war, saying that "the combat power of our army is sufficient to completely destroy your so-called Baltic-Black Sea Union."

If Putin follows through with his pledge, it will be the first time since the fall of the Soviet Union that Moscow will have stationed nuclear weapons outside of the country. Putin has defended the move by comparing it to the U.S. stationing its weapons in Europe.

"There is nothing unusual here either," the Russian president said last Saturday, while talking on state television. "Firstly, the United States has been doing this for decades. They have long deployed their tactical nuclear weapons on the territory of their allied countries."

It's not yet know exactly when the weapons will be transferred to Belarus.