Renew: 19/03/2022 16:05
Issued by: 19/03/2022, 16:05
Minsk/Moscow – Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko dismissed speculation about Vladimir Putin’s health. According to him, the Russian president is physically and mentally healthy and “in better shape than before”. Lukashenko stated this in an interview with Japanese television station TBS.
“We don’t just meet as heads of state, our relations are friendly,” the Belarusian leader said in an interview shared by Belarusian state news agency BelTA. “I am privy to all the details, if possible, both state and private,” added Lukashenko.
Representatives of Western countries have stated several times that Putin miscalculated when he launched his attack on Ukraine. Russian troops have so far suffered heavy losses in the fighting and their progress has almost stopped despite their numerical superiority, Reuters news agency said.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson addressed the Russian president saying he was acting irrationally. Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte described him as “absolutely paranoid”.
Lukashenko rejects all these claims. “West and you must also get rid of this stupidity, this nonsense out of your head,” the Belarusian president told a Japanese media representative. “Putin is really fit, he’s in better shape than ever… He’s a really healthy person mentally and physically, he’s an athlete. As they say here – he caught a cold at all our funerals ,” added Lukashenko.
The authoritarian Belarusian leader has given Russia military territory in his country to attack Ukraine, but has so far been reluctant to engage in open war with Ukraine.
According to official data, Lukashenko won a sixth term as president in the August 2020 election, but the vote was marred by widespread fraud, according to the opposition. Many consider the real winner of the election to be opposition candidate Svjatlana Cichanouska, who had to flee to Lithuania. Cichanouská, on the other hand, strongly opposed the invasion and called on Belarusians to do the same.
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