Belarus holds military drills on border with Lithuania and Poland

MOSCOW

Belarus on Tuesday announced its armed forces are holding military exercises near the country's borders with Lithuania and Poland.

The Defense Ministry said one of the stages of the exercises took place at the Gozhsky training ground in Grodno, and the organizers created conditions "as close as possible to the real combat situation."

Tensions between Belarus, a Russian ally, and Poland have risen in recent days, particularly because of the presence of the Wagner paramilitary group, which found refuge in the Eastern European country after its short-lived mutiny against Moscow in June.

Poland on Monday deployed an additional contingent of 1,000 troops on its border with Belarus, a day after it accused Minsk of orchestrating another migration influx into the EU via the Polish border.