Alexander Lukashenko and Vladimir Putin have altered their tactics in recent weeks, focusing the attention of their growing alliance of sorts directly on Ukraine as efforts to restart talks to halt seven years of conflict in Ukraine’s Donbas region between its army and Russian proxies show few signs of success.

Cloaked in a degree of mystery, Belarusian President Lukashenko’s heightened insistence that the biggest threat facing his country comes from Kyiv followed a “private” Black Sea meeting with the Kremlin leader in late September. Nudged closer to Putin by a year of domestic tumult and a crackdown on dissent following his contested re-election to a sixth term in office, Lukashenko has met the Kremlin leader at least a half dozen times in 2021.

The more strident tone, including allegations that NATO is on the brink of establishing bases in Ukraine, coincided with stiff Russian resistance to any resumption of talks in the “Normandy format” to end the fighting in Donbas, which has killed more than 13,000 people. Kyiv is pressing for a new meeting, but Putin and his veteran foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, have taken it in turns to say there is “no point” in a resumption and blame Ukraine for failing to fulfil necessary conditions.

Lukashenko has for months expressed particular distaste for Ukraine – where after initially pledging to do a deal with the Kremlin, President Volodymyr Zelensky now sees NATO membership as the sole means to end the war in Donbas, though such membership is a distant prospect. In July, Lukashenko ordered the border with Ukraine sealed.

SIGHTS TRAINED ON KYIV

But the Belarusian leader showed new vigour in training his sights on Kyiv after the talks with Putin.

“Particular attention was focused on (the border) with Ukraine. On what we are going to do there,” Lukashenko told a televised meeting with military officials after returning home from the meeting.  “You see, they are bringing in NATO troops to Ukraine. They’re making it look like training centres, but what they are creating is de facto bases. U.S. bases in Ukraine. It is clear that we have to react to this.

‘We agreed that some sort of action must be taken. Otherwise, tomorrow we will have an unacceptable situation right on the border between Russia and Belarus. Up to and including the deployment of missiles with an appropriate range. We did not agree to this and cannot accept it.”

Lukashenko offered no evidence to bolster his allegations.

Ukraine rejected them as well as a new Kremlin statement that NATO membership for Ukraine amounted to a “red line” that Russia would not accept. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said: “Putin’s ‘red lines’ are limited to Russia’s borders.”

Things were not always like this in the course of Lukashenko’s 27 years in power.

After Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea and the armed takeover by Russian proxies of large swathes of eastern Ukraine, the Belarusian leader showed a remarkable understanding of Ukraine’s positions. He tried to act as an honest broker on the Donbas issue and the initial agreements to halt the fighting were signed in Minsk. He initially did not recognise Russia’s takeover of Crimea and said Belarus would never allow its territory to be used to attack another state.

But Lukashenko has clearly altered his stance after enduring weeks of mass protests alleging he won re-election last year by rigging the vote. More than 30,000 opposition supporters were detained – mostly for short periods – and top opposition activists have either fled the country or been sentenced to long prison terms.

Putin offered support for the embattled Belarusian leader, including military support if necessary. Their meetings since have moved forward the agenda on creating a merged “union state” between Russia and Belarus and last month 28 agreements, mostly economic, were signed to advance the process. But Lukashenko has studiously avoided any notion of Russia simply absorbing Belarus by pointing repeatedly to the country’s “sovereignty”.

MOSCOW DIGS IN ITS HEELS ON NORMANDY TALKS

Moscow has in recent weeks dug in its heels on any notion of a new “Normandy” format meeting on Donbas – made up of France, Germany, Russia and Ukraine – accusing Kyiv of failing to implement provisions of those initial “Minsk agreements”. In particular, Russia describes the conflict as a “civil war” not of its making and has told Zelensky to meet the “separatists” holding parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions directly.

Ukraine has steadfastly refused.

Zelensky last week repeated his insistence that the “Normandy format” was the sole means to resolve the conflict – he met Putin in Paris in December 2019 with few results. And a European Union-Ukraine summit last week singled out ”Russia’s responsibility as a party to the conflict”.

“I was, of course, a little surprised at the insistence of our Western colleagues in seeking a resumption of the Normandy format without ensuring that the previous agreements were being fulfilled,” the Russian Foreign Ministry quoted minister Lavrov as saying.

Putin, in his recent discussions with European leaders, had “pointed out concrete facts which demonstrably show that Kyiv is not fulfilling what it is obliged to do,” the Russian foreign minister said.

Commentator Ivan Yakovina, speaking on Ukraine’s NV radio, said the focus of Belarus’s dealings with Russia may have changed as Lukashenko finds himself more dependent on Moscow. Russia, he said, may be concentrating on joint strategic military action. Politics, however, remained a consideration, he said, as Lukashenko announced purchases of sophisticated Russian arms and held top-level meetings to prepare the way for a Moscow-inspired overhaul of Belarus’s constitution next year.

“But this looks strange. Lukashenko has no money. And this more than likely means that the Kremlin is boosting its military presence in Belarus…,” Yakovina said.

“… And poor Lukashenko cannot come up with a format for a new constitution. For him, it is of primary importance to retain control of the country, to keep control of his power. But the Kremlin has been clear in telling him that the current system in which Lukashenko basically has the powers of a tsar is unsuitable and those powers must be diluted … So he has asked those around him to find a way to meet the Russian demands while retaining power.”