Estonian MFA said the aim of military exercise in Belarus was to divide Baltic states from NATO

Urmas Paet criticized the Russian–Belarusian military drills at the Riga Conference.

The military exercise close to the Baltic borders demonstrates that Russia still uses significant means to fight against NATO, Urmas Paet, the foreign minister of Estonia, told on October 24, Razeta.ru reports referring to Interfax.

Russia has held the biggest military exercise close to the Baltic states for the last ten years, which aim was to “divide the three Baltic states from NATO”, Paet believes.

“The drills demonstrate the way Moscow still thinks,” the foreign minister concluded.

Minister of defence of Latvia Imants Liegis said earlier incursion into the Baltic states to liberate “besieged Kaliningrad” was one of the tasks of Zapad-2009 Russian–Belarusian military exercise.

We remind that Belarusian military analyst Alyaksandr Alesin said at the end of September that liberation of Kaliningrad by the Russian army and establishing the Baltic lodgement was trained during the exercise.

In response, president of Estonia Toomas Hendrik Ilves offered to hold TATO drills in the Baltic states.