Putin’s £274m Spy Plane ‘Destroyed In Drone Strike Near Minsk By Pro-Ukraine Belarus Group’

Vladimir Putin’s £274m spy plane has reportedly been destroyed in a drone strike near Minsk by a pro-Ukraine Belarus group.

Belarusian supporters and opposition members in exile said they damaged a Russian A-50 military surveillance plane as part of a secret mission.

The two Belarusians who carried out the operation had used drones, said Franak Viacorka, a close adviser to opposition figurehead Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, adding that they had already left the country and were safe.

The front and center parts of the AWACS Beriev A-50U aircraft, as well as the radar antenna, were damaged as a result of two explosions in the attack on the Machulishchy airbase near Minsk, the Belarusian anti-government organization BYPOL said.

“Partisans… confirmed a successful special operation to blow up a rare Russian plane at the Machulishchy airfield near Minsk,” Viacorka tweeted. “This is the most successful diversion since the beginning of 2022.”

The Beriev A-50 aircraft, which has the NATO reporting name of Mainstay, is a Russian airborne early warning aircraft, with airborne command and control capabilities, and the ability to track up to 60 targets at a time.

The distinctive aircraft carries a fiberglass radome more than 33 feet in diameter that houses the rotating antenna of the Shmel radar complex. Its long-range radar detection system has been used to identify bombing targets inside Ukraine for Putin’s air forces.

“I am proud of all Belarusians who continue to resist the hybrid Russian occupation of Belarus and fight for the freedom of Ukraine,” Tsikhanouskaya wrote on Twitter.

Reports of the drone strike could not be independently verified. There was no official confirmation from Russia or Belarus and no immediate response from their defense ministries to requests for comment.

But local residents said that police and security services were conducting extensive searches near Machulishchi in the Minsk region, according to reports.

A local resident said: ‘Half of Machulishchi is cordoned off. Lots of soldiers everywhere. We saw five military vehicles with machine guns. They are stopping all the cars and minibuses there, checking suitcases and trunks.

Since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine a year ago, there have been various acts of sabotage in Belarus and in the Russian border regions with Ukraine, especially in the railway system.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, a key Putin ally, provided Moscow with a launching pad for the invasion and has there has been Russian and Belarusian military activity in the country ever since.

Ukrainian servicemen from the 68th Separate Jager Infantry Brigade “Oleksa Dovbush” fire an M2 machine gun at a frontline position at an undisclosed location in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine on Sunday.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, a key Putin ally (pictured together on February 17), provided Moscow with a launching pad for the invasion and there has been Russian and Belarusian military activity in the country ever since.

kyiv says Russia has also used Belarusian airstrips as a base from which to launch attacks on Ukraine.

In recent months, Belarus and Russia have carried out a series of military operations, and Ukraine has expressed fears that Minsk will come into conflict. A number of Russian fighter jets and early warning and control airborne aircraft have been deployed in Belarus.

The destroyed A-50 aircraft reportedly carried the registration number RF-50608. He arrived in Belarus on January 3 and had made a dozen trips related to the war in Ukraine.

Russia only has six modernized A-50U aircraft, each of which has a crew of 19. It can track 60 targets simultaneously.

Machulishchi is used as a base for Putin’s MiG-31K fighter jets, which carry Kinzhal hypersonic missiles, for strikes against Ukraine. These MiGs are often accompanied by the A-50U during operations.

The A-50U is designed to detect, track, and identify large air, ground, and naval targets, transmit relevant data to command posts, and direct combat aircraft to air targets.

The Belarusian human rights group Vyasna said on Monday that a woman was detained in Machulishchy but the reason and her whereabouts are unknown.

There was no information on whether the arrest was related to the alleged sabotage of the aircraft.

Arrests are common in Belarus, for offenses as small as social media comments, especially after Lukashenko crushed mass pro-democracy protests in 2020 and jailed all major opposition figures or forced them to flee into the country. foreign.