MINSK. March 7 (Interfax) - Over 20 accomplices of the person who committed an act of sabotage targeting Russia's A-50 early warning and control aircraft at the Machulishchi military airfield in Belarus have been detained, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said.
"Over 20 accomplices have been detained in Belarusian territory as of now," the BelTA state-owned news agency quoted Lukashenko as saying.
"The rest are hiding there [abroad]," he said.
Following the incident involving the A-50, Belarusian security agencies have carried out "the cruelest mop-up," he said.
"So that there should be no speculations, everyone should understand, and I'm not denying that - I ordered a few days ago, even before this operation, that the cruelest possible mop-up be conducted in the entire country," Lukashenko said.
"That's a lesson for all of us. They've hidden and are sitting and waiting for something. It's going to be like in 1941, no denying that: when the Nazis came here, there had been those cells, those accomplices. And then they put an armband and a Schmeisser [submachine gun] over their shoulder, and acted along with those Nazis. Nothing has changed. Therefore, we have to find them. And I'd like to tell them that they should get ready. We're coming for them. Our guys are already at the doorstep, let them get ready," he said.
Lukashenko warned that the best option for such people is to surrender.
"This would be a salvation for them. We'll expose all of them. We'll purge them out of our society. They still haven't realized anything over these two and a half years. They haven't realized that we're treating them humanely: if you come to your senses, come back. And this doesn't cancel anything. There are enough of those stupefied and zombified there, let them come back. Confessions have already been coming in. But as for those who have committed such offenses and especially those committing them now and who are accomplices to terrorists, we'll find them," Lukashenko said.
Earlier on Tuesday, Lukashenko said several people, including a Russian recruited by Ukrainian special services, were detained on suspicion of their role in an act of sabotage at the Machulishchi airfield, where a Russian A-50 aircraft was stationed.
Belarus earlier described reports on an attack on the Machulishchi airfield at the end of February, in which the A-50 was damaged, as fake.
The Kremlin then refrained from commenting on those reports.
The Belarus 1 state-owned TV channel later showed a serviceable A-50 moving along the runway, and a number of Belarusian media outlets posted videos of the plane's takeoff the next day.