Belarus Summons Ukrainian Envoy Over 1 Death in Drone Strike on Soccer Team Bus

Q: Why was a bus full of children traveling through a Russian warzone near the Ukrainian border?

The bus was traveling through Bryansk because it was taking a Belarusian youth soccer team from Rechitsa in the Gomel region to Gelendzhik, a Black Sea resort in southern Russia, for a vacation and likely sports-related activities. That route put the group in a dangerous area because Bryansk borders Ukraine and has been repeatedly exposed to cross-border attacks, drone incidents and military activity since Russia’s full-scale war began. In practical terms, the children were not being taken into a battlefield for military reasons; they were on a civilian trip that happened to pass through a region widely regarded as a war-risk zone. Why that was allowed is now a major issue. Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya said officials acted irresponsibly by permitting children to travel through a “border zone of military activity.” Even President Alexander Lukashenko suggested the trip should not have happened, saying parents had decided to send the children to Gelendzhik and warning that such travel should stop without government approval. Reports indicate the trip may have been organized privately rather than as a tightly supervised state mission. That helps explain how a youth team ended up on a route many critics say should have been avoided. The core answer is simple: the bus was on its way to a Russian resort, and the chosen overland route passed through a border region that, despite being dangerous, was still being used for civilian travel.

3 articles · Updated · The Moscow Times · Jun 18

Belarus on Thursday called in Ukraine’s chargé d’affaires, Ivan Novitsky, and delivered a formal protest after a drone strike on a bus carrying a Belarusian youth soccer team killed one woman.
Six others were wounded in Russia’s Bryansk region, including four teenagers, prompting Russian federal investigators to open a terrorism case and Moscow to denounce the attack as a crime.
Minsk said Ukraine must conduct an immediate, objective investigation and punish those responsible, while warning Belarus reserves the right to take what it called appropriate retaliatory action.
Kyiv denied targeting the bus and called the accusations a provocation; human rights ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets said he was ready to help establish the facts impartially.
Alexander Lukashenko said the drone was of Ukrainian origin and warned against dragging Belarus into the war, a sensitive threat because Minsk let Russia use its territory in the 2022 invasion.