Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko says Russia’s experimental road-mobile ground-based missile system Oreshnik was placed on combat duty in Belarus on December 17.
He made the announcement in his Address to the Belarusian People and Parliament, Belta reported.
“The first positions have been prepared for the Oreshnik missile system. We have had it since yesterday, and it is going on combat duty,” he said.
Back in early November, at the 3rd Minsk International Conference on Eurasian Security, Lukashenko said Russia stores part of its nuclear weapons in Belarus and has deployed medium-range Oreshnik ballistic missiles there.
“The deployment of this weapon in Belarus is merely a response to the escalation,” he said, referring to the war in Ukraine.
Lukashenko has insisted that Minsk threatens no one and is focused solely on its own security.
Oreshnik is an experimental medium-range ballistic missile system. Russian President Vladimir Putin has claimed that in mass use, strikes by the Oreshnik system would be comparable in power to the use of nuclear weapons.
Delivery of Oreshnik missiles to Belarus followed the four-day Zapad-2025 drills held by Russia and Belarus, during which the ballistic system was among the weapons tested.
Russia first fired the missile at Ukraine in November 2024, striking Dnipro. Detection by air defenses is complicated by Oreshnik’s speed of several thousand kilometers per hour and its flight in the upper layers of the atmosphere.
Russian lawmakers have also floated an idea of sending Oreshnik to Cuba and Venezuela.
Lukashenko has also claimed that Ukraine would “disappear from the map” if the Russia-Ukraine war continues.
