A pro-Ukraine Belarus group has reportedly destroyed a Russian A-50 surveillance military aircraft worth £274million in a drone attack near Minsk.
According to Belarusian partisans and members of the exiled opposition, the operation was carried out using drones by two Belarusians who had already left the country and were safe.
Front and central parts of the AWACS Beriev A-50U aircraft, as well as the radar antenna, were damaged by two explosions in the attack at the Machulishchy air base near Minsk.
The Beriev A-50 is a Russian airborne early warning aircraft that has airborne command and control capabilities and can track up to 60 targets at a time. The long-range radar detection system of the distinctive plane has been used to pinpoint bombing targets inside Ukraine for Putin’s air forces.
Reports of the drone attack could not be independently verified, and there was no official confirmation from Russia or Belarus. However, there were major searches underway by police and security services close to Machulishchi in the Minsk region, according to reports.
The destroyed A-50 plane carried the registration number RF-50608 and arrived in Belarus on 3 January, having made a dozen sorties linked to the war in Ukraine.
Since the beginning of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine a year ago, there have been several acts of sabotage in Belarus and in Russian regions bordering Ukraine.
Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko, a key Putin ally, provided Moscow with a launching pad for the invasion, and there has been Russian and Belarusian military activity in the country since then.
In recent months, Belarus and Russia have held a series of military operations, and Ukraine has expressed fears that Minsk will enter the conflict. Several Russian warplanes and airborne early warning and control aircraft have been deployed to Belarus.
Detentions are common in Belarus, for offenses as small as comments on social media, especially after Lukashenko crushed the mass-pro democracy protests in 2020 and jailed all leading opposition figures or forced them to flee abroad.
»Russia’s £274m spy plane destroyed in drone attack near Minsk by pro-Ukraine Belarus group«
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