Nearly 9,000 Russian servicemen to arrive in Belarus

Russia's Defence Ministry has said that about 9,000 Russian servicemen will arrive in Belarus as part of the deployment of a joint group of troops.

The statement came from the head of the ministry's international military cooperation department, assistant minister, Valeriy Revenko, on October 16, Interfax reports.

"The first echelons with Russian servicemen who are part of the regional grouping of troops began to arrive in the Republic of Belarus. The relocation will take several days. The total number will be just under 9,000 people," he tweeted.

More detailed information, according to Revenko, will be provided at a briefing for military attaches on October 17.

As reported, on October 10, Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko announced that he had agreed with Russian President Vladimir Putin on the deployment of a joint regional group of troops "in connection with the aggravation on the western borders of the Union State".

According to Lukashenko, the agreement was reached during a one-on-one meeting with the Russian president in St Petersburg after an informal CIS summit.

The Belarus Defence Ministry emphasised that the group is deployed "to ensure parity in the field of military security and maintain peace in Belarus", and also that this decision "is being implemented in the interests of strengthening the protection and defence of the state border of Belarus to reduce military activity in the border areas".

The ministry reported earlier that the basis of the regional grouping of troops will be the armed forces of Belarus in peacetime, as well as Russian individual military groups.