Belarus, a close ally of Russia, has supported its eastern neighbour in the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. Before the start of the offensive, Belarus allowed the Russian Armed Forces to perform weeks-long military drills on its territory; however, the Russian troops did not exit the country after they were supposed to finish. Belarus allowed Russia to stage part of the invasion from its territory, giving Russia the shortest possible land route to Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv.
Belarus initially denied involvement with the conflict, but has since admitted to allowing Russian missile launchers stationed on its territory to shoot at Ukrainian targets. Several reports emerged among the Belarusian opposition and Ukrainian military that Belarusian troops were in Ukraine fighting together with Russians, but Belarus’s leader Aleksander Lukashenko dismissed them and said that the Belarusian Armed Forces would not participate directly in the conflict.
The involvement of Belarus was condemned in Western countries, with the European Union, the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, and Japan imposing sanctions against Belarus. According to Chatham House, Belarus’s participation in the military conflict is unpopular among the general population; protests were held on 27 February, the day of the constitutional referendum which asked to revoke Belarus’s non-nuclear country status, but were quickly dispersed. Several hackers affiliated with the Belarusian opposition, the Ukrainian military or with Anonymous have targeted Belarusian government agencies as well as the country’s critical infrastructure, with the aim of disrupting the Russian war effort in Belarus.
Belarus’ Turkey Summit participation discussed in Istanbul
01.03.2013 16:03
MINSK, 1 March (BelTA) – Participation of a delegation from Belarus in the international summit Turkey World Trade Bridge 2013 was discussed in Istanbul on 28 February, BelTA learnt from the Embassy of Belarus in Turkey.
The issue was considered as part of the talks held between Consul General Igor Bely and Deputy Secretary General of the Confederation of Businessmen and Industrialists of Turkey (Tuskon) Coskun Erten.
The international summit Turkey World Trade Bridge 2013 highlighting the construction industry will be held in Istanbul in June.
The World Trade Bridge first held by Tuskon in 2006 has gained great popularity and recognition in international business circles. For example, partaking in the 2012 Summit dedicated to the textile industry were over 1,000 businessmen from 130 countries, including private companies of Belarus, and about nearly 1,500 Turkish companies interested in developing international contacts.
Mr Erten stressed Turkey’s interest in further development of business contacts between the two countries.
The parties agreed to host the presentation of Belarus’ business potential at Tuscon.
Mikhail Kozlov Deputy Director of Operative Department on Customs Services AsstrA Associated Traffic AG
Development of the customs union is approaching the next landmark — actual formation of the unified customs territory of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia.
Starting from July 1, 2011, customs control on the inner borders of the three countries will be abolished; veterinary, phytosanitary and transport control will be moved to the CU’s external borders. As of Jan. 1, 2011, there are unified forms and instructions on declaring goods.
At the same time there are still unsolved problems connected with the functioning of the unified customs territory:
1) The uniform application of international customs conventions. The agreement on TIR convention applications on the CU territory has not yet been signed because of the position of Kazakhstan that lies in the possibility of TIR procedures being applied for international goods transportation on the CU territory. At present by TIR procedure Kazakh carriers perform a great volume of cargo transportation from the Chinese-Kazakh border to Russia and Belarus. Unfortunately, in the CU customs code there is no analogue and quite simple guarantee system that can be used instead of the TIR procedure.
Kazakhstan still has not joined the Istanbul convention on temporary import/export of goods, which is why the agreement on the application of this convention on the CU territory was not even developed. Meanwhile Belarus and Russia have not yet solved the problem of guaranteeing transportation of goods through the territory of Belarus to Russia by the Belarussian Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
2) In the CU customs code the principle of residence is left for regular people participating in customs declaration in the CU: customs applicant of the customs procedure, customs representative and authorized economic operator, which makes the process of logistics optimization of commodity flows at the unified customs territory. For example, a freight forwarder of FLLC AsstrA Weisrussland — an approved economic operator in Belarus — cannot conduct the procedure of customs transit to Russia or Kazakhstan without payment of customs duties, taxes under his status of the AEO. Russian trade operator Perekryostok cannot put goods under the customs procedure of transfer for free turnover in Belarus in the immediate vicinity from the CU external border at TLC Brest-Beltamozhservice. With this purpose he has to register a residential company in Belarus.
3) In the field of tariff regulations there are no unified trade rules of procedure and impressments of country-members of the CU with third countries. In Kazakhstan there are still transitional rates of customs duties by 400 commodity items, different from the rates of the CU customs duties. In customs services of the CU, the indicatives for application of additional measures of documental control by determination of customs prices of goods differ.
4) In the field of non-tariff regulations there is the burning issue of developing unified technical rules of procedure for technical regulation. Belarus and Kazakhstan are against the transfer of veterinary control functions to the customs bodies at the border, which comes into force in Russia from July 1, 2011.
We would like to mark the problem of absence of actual simplifications in the work of customs representatives in the process of declaring goods, of a higher level of trust on the part of the customs officials to their work, despite quite a big size (1 million euros) of provision of customs duty payment.
The unified instruction for the CU on CMR note filling-in was developed as a simple sum of national instructions, it requires indication of the information not only for purposes of tariff and non-tariff regulation, statistics of foreign commerce and currency exchange regulations, but also the information necessary for different bodies of public administration, and that is why it is quite difficult and labor-intensive. All these factors led to the increase of prices for the services of customs representatives.
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A Russian S-400 air defense battery, which is based on the S-300 design
Summary
Turkey is reportedly in the process of acquiring late-model Russian air defense technology from Ukraine and Belarus, Turkish daily Today’s Zaman reported Aug. 25. Bought second-hand, these systems would be used for the Turkish air force to train against, rather than to upgrade Ankara’s aging air defense network. That training could prove an important tool for both Turkey specifically and NATO in general.
Analysis
Turkey is in the process of acquiring several variants of the Russian S-300 air defense system, Turkish daily Today’s Zaman reported Aug. 25. The systems — reportedly to be acquired second-hand from Belarus and Ukraine — are not meant to revitalize Ankara’s aging air defense network; they are intended to be a training tool for the Turkish air force. Turkey decided to make the purchase July 22 — before the Russo-Georgian conflict — but should the deal go through, the lessons Turkey hopes to learn will almost certainly proliferate to NATO as a whole.
The S-300 encompasses a number of long-range strategic air defense systems (some variants also have a limited ballistic missile defense capability). Turkey has its sights set on both the S-300 and S-300V. The former, known to NATO as the SA-10B/C/D, encompasses several models of varying capability, but in short approaches the height of Soviet strategic air defense systems. Though neither Ukraine nor Belarus has the most modern S-300 variants — the PMU series — Turkey will likely attempt to acquire a PMU-series variant from them if it can, because Ankara knows Greece fields a PMU1 variant on Crete.
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The S-300V, meanwhile, shares the same design heritage as the S-300 (including some component parts). But while its spectrum of coverage and engagement envelope are quite similar, it is a distinct air defense system (known to NATO as the SA-12) characterized by the large tracked vehicles on which it is mounted. The S-300V was designed with a higher degree of mobility in mind. Russian troops deployed near the Turkish border in Armenia are protected by an S-300V battery.
Both the United States and Israel reportedly were able to acquire some S-300 components during the 1990s (including, in the U.S. case, parts of the S-300V), but the Turkish effort could include a later model or a more complete system.
Should Turkey succeed in this acquisition, Ankara’s subsequent work would take two important approaches. The first is reverse engineering, where key components are disassembled and their inner workings closely examined.. The second is training in electronic warfare against actual systems.
Ukraine and Belarus have neither the newest nor the best-maintained air defense hardware. The condition of the equipment Ankara seeks to buy is unclear, and Russia may be in a position to block at least the Belarusian part of the sale. But perhaps the most significant aspect of this news is the intention to train against it — not just dissecting the missile, but actually flying against functional systems.
A training range at Konya, less than 150 miles south of Ankara, is reportedly slated to host this Russian hardware, along with the shorter-range Russian Tor-M1. According to the report, the systems will be integrated with an electronic warfare training system with which Turkey’s F-16s will conduct exercises.
If Turkey is able to acquire even one of the three S-300 variants it seeks, it will undoubtedly work at the training range to learn and test the technology’s performance parameters. This will allow Turkey (and any other NATO allies who happen to train with Turkish forces at the Konya facility) to test tactics and challenge the system over and over again. Whether it will succeed in acquiring a PMU1 remains to be seen, but even older variants could offer very real insight into some of the overall S-300 design’s ultimate limitations and weaknesses. And the result will be a Turkish air force more capable of addressing the two most advanced air defense systems positioned on its periphery: the Greek S-300PMU1 batteries (which were originally slated for Cyprus) to its southwest and the Russian S-300V battery in Armenia, on its eastern border.
