Zelensky says Russia weighs five scenarios to expand war via Belarus and Bryansk

In his evening address on May 20, President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia is "considering scenarios for additional attacks against Ukraine" from an axis running between Belarus and the Russian city of Bryansk, more than 100 kilometres east of the Belarusian border. The strikes would target northern Ukraine, particularly the Chernihiv–Kyiv front. He spoke after a Supreme Commander-in-Chief Staff meeting that reviewed Ukrainian intelligence on Russian planning for offensive operations in that sector.

Ukrainian intelligence has identified five Russian scenarios for expanding the war through northern Ukraine, Zelensky said, and Kyiv is preparing a response for each. He ordered military reinforcement of the Chernihiv–Kyiv direction and told the Foreign Ministry to "prepare additional diplomatic pressure measures regarding Belarus." Classified tasks were also assigned to the intelligence services. "We need to increase pressure and strengthen coordination with our partners," he said. "Frankly, it's already quite annoying that Ukraine constantly faces this kind of threat – that at some point the Russians may drag Belarus into the expansion of the war. They must understand there: consequences for them will follow and be significant."

Zelensky said Ukrainian intelligence had also reviewed information about Russian preparations to mobilise an additional 100,000 troops. "We believe that, as of today, Russia lacks such potential for covert mobilisation, so we should expect Russian political decisions of another format, including those like the recent one regarding the Transnistrian region of Moldova," he said. The address followed a Russian–Belarusian exercise that began on May 18 and involved drills on the use of "modern means of destruction, including special munitions"; Moscow's defence ministry put the wider nuclear-readiness drill at 64,000 troops, more than 200 missile launchers, 140 aircraft, 73 ships and 13 submarines, with Belarusian forces practising delivery procedures for tactical nuclear munitions based on their territory.

Ukraine is also "preparing an expansion of the geography of long-range sanctions," Zelensky said. On the same day, Ukrainian forces struck the Lukoil refinery in Kstovo, Nizhny Novgorod region — one of Russia's ten largest — and several other oil-sector targets. Robert "Madyar" Brovdy, commander of Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Forces, said 10 major Russian refineries have been hit since the start of May, with six forced to halt operations. General Oleksandr Syrsky, Ukraine's commander-in-chief, told the NATO–Ukraine Council in Brussels that Russia is losing "at least a thousand soldiers killed or wounded each day" on the Ukrainian front, with cumulative 2026 losses above 141,500, including more than 83,000 "irreversible."

The northern flank warning landed amid heightened activity across NATO's eastern edge. Lithuania closed Vilnius airport temporarily on May 20 after an apparent drone crossed from Belarusian airspace; the state leadership took shelter and NATO fighters were scrambled. Estonian Defence Minister Hanno Pevkur defended Tuesday's first-ever shoot-down by a NATO aircraft of an in-flying drone — likely Ukrainian and headed for Russian targets — saying minimal collateral risk drove the decision. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Russia's "public threats against our Baltic states are completely unacceptable" and that "a threat against one member state is a threat against the whole Union." NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, briefing reporters in Brussels, warned the consequences would be "devastating" if Moscow used nuclear weapons, and said the PURL mechanism — set up after Donald Trump's return to the White House to let European allies buy U.S. weapons for Ukraine — has provided about 70% of the missiles for Ukrainian Patriot batteries, including PAC-3s, and 90% of munitions for other Ukrainian air-defence systems. Rutte added that the planned U.S. withdrawal of roughly 5,000 troops from Germany — about 14% of the 36,000 stationed there — would have "no impact" on alliance capability and unfold over six to twelve months.

The Belarus axis is not a new file for Kyiv. On May 15, Zelensky said Russia was continuing attempts to drag Belarus into the war, possibly with the aim of operations against both Ukraine and a NATO state. Estonian politicians and Lithuanian Prime Minister Inga Ruginienė pushed back on what they called alarmist rhetoric, saying his Baltic-threat framing complicates allied coordination. Hungarian Prime Minister Péter Magyar, breaking from his predecessor Viktor Orban, said in Warsaw that "Ukraine is the victim, and it has every right to defend its territorial sovereignty and integrity by every means at its disposal," signalling a thaw in the bilateral relationship. Belarus, which served as a launch pad for Moscow's 2022 invasion, has so far refrained from committing its own forces to combat operations.