Belarus’s President Alexander Lukashenko welcomed the more than 600 participants in the 4th Minsk International Conference on Eurasian Security on Nov. 3 with a wide-ranging speech touching upon all the main items on the international agenda, with a particular focus on the situation in Ukraine and the failure of the post-WWII institutions to prevent such a conflict in the heart of Europe. “The old world order has crumbled before our eyes and a new one has not yet formed,” he said. “Security mechanisms in the form of arms control and confidence-building measures have effectively collapsed. The system of checks and balances, which during the Cold War prevented us from sliding into the abyss of a global nuclear conflict, is no longer functioning.”

While praising the role of President Trump in his attempts to bring the Ukraine conflict to a conclusion, he also condemned the Trump administration for its attack on Iran and assassination of Supreme Leader Khamenei and his wife. “But Trump, with his actions,” he added, “however contradictory, is essentially keeping the world from a third world war, which could ignite in a nuclear format. And there’s no escape from this beyond the ocean.”

“If we don’t stop in Ukraine now,” he went on, “as Trump himself said, if we don’t stop, but continue down the path of escalation, we will definitely end up in World War III. And even top politicians are already talking out loud about how it will end. And you can’t hide from a nuclear strike overseas. That’s why Trump is doing a great thing,” the Belarusian leader said.