Belarusian Special Forces to Undergo Training in Kazakhstan

Members of the Special Operations Forces of Belarus will undergo training in Kazakhstan.

The Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Belarus stated that the soldiers will undergo tactical and special exercises as part of the Top of Brotherhood-2024.

The training takes place at training points where combined units of Belarus and Kazakhstan organize ambushes and raids.

The exercises also include firearms and mountaineering training, as well as studying the specifics of operations in mountainous and desert terrain.

The Belarusian military contingent will be transported to Kazakhstan by IL-76MD aircraft.

The Top of Brotherhood 2024 exercise is being held at the Taktal military training ground in one of the regions of Kazakhstan.

More than 50 servicemen of the Special Operations Forces are taking part in the exercise from the Belarusian side.

Prior to this, the Belarusian military also began training with the Chinese military.

The 11-day joint exercise, called “Attack Falcon 2024,” started on July 8, 2024, just before the NATO summit, and is taking place near the Belarusian city of Brest, about five kilometers from the Polish border.

The first-of-its-kind exercise between China and Belarus reflects the growing defense ties between the two countries and is intended to send NATO a signal of firmness, analysts and officials say.

At a briefing on July 5 before the drills, which the Belarusian and Chinese defense ministries described as anti-terrorism exercises, Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Belarusian Armed Forces Vladimir Kuprianyuk stated the maneuvers were a response to “the aggressive foreign policy of the West towards the Union State” and “provocative actions by Ukraine.”

The drills come a few days after Belarus became the 10th member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), a regional defense bloc in which China and Russia play leading roles.