• Belarus' interior minister said armed forces had conducted drills in one of its border regions.
  • Ivan Kubrakov said the goal was to prevent a Kursk "scenario" and protect its population.
  • Ukraine caught Russia off guard last month by launching a cross-border attack into Kursk.

Belarus, a longtime Russian ally, said it has conducted military drills to prevent a Kursk "scenario" on its own territory.

In a Telegram post on Wednesday, Belarus' interior minister said a military exercise was held in the Brest region, bordering Ukraine and Poland, due to the ongoing "situation in Kursk Oblast."

Soldiers engaged in combat operations and practiced countering "sabotage" groups, which Ivan Kubrakov said was a "last resort."

"The main thing for us is to ensure the safety of the population by preventing insurgents from breaching settlements," he said, per a translation by Ukrainska Pravda.

"They must be eliminated before they reach the area," he added.

Piotr Parkhomchik, chairman of the region's executive committee, said it was "important to prepare the population for a possible invasion by armed groups from neighboring countries," per Ukrainska Pravda.

Ukraine caught Russia off guard by launching a shock offensive into western Russia on August 6, claiming almost 500 square miles of Russian territory earlier this month, according to Ukraine's army chief, Col. Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi.

The move has forced Russia to redeploy tens of thousands of soldiers to Kursk and stopped Russian advances in the city of Pokrovsk in eastern Ukraine, Syrskyi told CNN last week.

It's also complicated Russian plans for offensive operations later this year, Ukraine's military spymaster, Kyrylo Budanov, told Ukrainian radio station Radio Charter, per a translation by the Institute for the Study of War.

In an update on Wednesday, The Institute for the Study of War reported that Russian forces had begun launching counteroffensives on the western border of the Ukrainian-held territory.

But it said it's "premature to draw conclusions about Russia's new counterattacks."

Read the original article on Business Insider