The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry decided to recall its ambassador to Belarus Igor Kizim for consultations after Alexander Lukashenko's meeting with the head of the "DPR" Denis Pushilin.
“We consider the meeting with a representative of the Russian occupation administration, who is hiding from the Ukrainian investigation for committing grave crimes and is under Ukrainian and international sanctions, another and blatant unfriendly act on the part of the Republic of Belarus aimed at supporting the aggressor state of the Russian Federation,” the statement of the Ukrainian MFA.
The department believes that the meeting between Lukashenka and Pushilin is an “attempt to legitimize” the latter. “Minsk must refrain from such destructive steps and stop supporting Russia’s aggressive war against Ukraine,” the Foreign Ministry writes.
The meeting between Pushilin and Lukashenka took place on April 18 in Minsk. At it, the self-elected president of Belarus discussed the situation at the front with a representative of the Russian occupation and offered help to the “DPR”: “And people need to be fed. Therefore, we are ready to provide appropriate assistance and support so that people who are not strangers to us there finally stop suffering.”