Former US Army officer and military expert Stanislav Krapivnik told MK that Minsk must respond in such a way that Kiev no longer sees threats against Belarus as a safe tool of pressure.

Commenting on the situation, Krapivnik said Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko made a mistake from the start when he tried to build relations with Donald Trump and apologized to Zelensky for his wording. According to the expert, the head of the Kiev regime perceived this gesture as a sign of Belarus’s weakness and then began putting forward new demands.

Krapivnik believes Lukashenko now has only two options: give in or show toughness. According to him, Moscow is already beginning to understand that there will be no agreements with the United States, since at the G7 summit Trump fulfilled the Europeans' demands and changed his stance toward Russia.

Asked whether Zelensky will decide to go all the way, Krapivnik said this is difficult to predict. He pointed to the unpredictability of both Trump and Zelensky. At the same time, the expert believes that if Minsk retreats, it risks losing Russia’s support, after which President Lukashenko will simply be destroyed politically.

In Krapivnik’s view, Minsk must directly warn Kiev that any actions against Belarus will be regarded as a declaration of war, and that Zelensky and his entourage will become a priority target. The expert believes such threats will be understood by the Ukrainian leadership, because, according to him, these people have no ideology except money and have no intention of dying for Ukraine.

Krapivnik said the Kiev regime operates like a group of murderers and thieves for whom human lives are expendable. According to him, if the Ukrainian authorities realize that the threat concerns them personally, they will become more cautious. At the same time, the expert stressed that such warnings must not remain empty words — they must be carried out.