The leader of the Belarusian opposition says Russia views neither Belarus nor Ukraine as independent sovereign states and the two countries should fight together to safeguard their very existence.
Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who moved to Lithuania after strongman Alyaksandr Lukashenka claimed victory in disputed August 2020 presidential election that many consider she won, said in an interview with the Associated Press that "there will be no free Belarus without free Ukraine."
Lukashenka is a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin and has backed Moscow's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.
Speaking on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York, Tsikhanouskaya said there will be constant security threats to Ukraine and on Belarus's western border as long as Putin is in power.
Tsikhanouskaya said neither country wants to be part of another Russian empire.
The Crisis In Belarus
Read our coverage as Belarusian strongman Alyaksandr Lukashenka continues his brutal crackdown on NGOs, activists, and independent media following the August 2020 presidential election.
"So Belarus is part of this problem and this problem, this crisis, has to be solved in this context," she said, adding that Lukashenka had to support Russia after its invasion because Putin backed him after the mass protests against his claim of victory in the 2020 election.
Since its invasion, Russia has used Belarus as a staging ground to send troops into Ukraine, and Moscow and Minsk have maintained close military ties.
Tsikhanouskaya said the war in Ukraine was "extremely unexpected" and some Belarusians were especially opposed to the war "against Ukrainians, our brothers and sisters."
She urged the international community to both keep up pressure against Lukashenka -- suggesting new sanctions on Belarusian exports of wood, potash and steel -- and to help Belarusian civil society, including human rights defenders.
There are now six packages of sanctions, pushed for by the opposition, against the Lukashenka regime.
"People are scared, of course," Tsikhanouskaya said. "We live like in a gulag actually in Belarus, but people have this energy to continue."