Mobile operator MTS has announced a tender to restore a base station in the Lelchytsy District of the Homiel Region following reports that communications infrastructure in the Polesia region had been damaged. Independent Belarusian outlet Flagshtok drew attention to the procurement notice on the operator’s website.
The tender concerns base station No. 1499, located near the village cultural center in the middle of Tonezh. The procurement documents do not specify what damage the infrastructure sustained, but they include engineering drawings for metal structures and electrical equipment.
The initial cost of restoring the 39-meter structure is nearly 700,000 Russian rubles (about $9,000). The procurement value is listed on a Russian electronic procurement platform. According to the report, this is currently the only MTS tender specifically covering construction and installation work to restore a damaged facility.
Earlier, independent Belarusian outlet This Minsk Media reported that a communications tower near Lelchytsy had been struck on July 5. Citing an unnamed source, the publication said the first attempted strike started a forest fire, followed by a second strike on the tower.
“The first strike missed, and the crashed drone started a forest fire. When firefighters arrived, they witnessed a second attempt, which hit the tower directly. Local residents were strictly forbidden from talking about what happened or even leaving their homes. But everyone here knows what happened,” one of the publication’s sources said.
Flagshtok checked fire data near the village of Tonezh using the FIRMS satellite monitoring service. According to the service, a fire was detected during the daytime on June 28 about three kilometers northeast of the MTS base station.
As previously reported, on June 19, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy gave Aliaksandr Lukashenka one week to switch off relay transmitters used by Russian drones, warning that otherwise Ukraine would destroy them. On June 24, Zelenskyy said the relay transmitters had been switched off on June 22.
Later on June 24, Zelenskyy said that four relay transmitters in the Homiel and Brest regions had stopped operating as of June 22.
During the night of June 26, five Russian Shahed drones (or decoys) flew from Belarus toward Korosten, reportedly once again using relay transmitters.
In an interview with TSN published on June 30, Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Oleksandr Syrskyi said Belarus had switched on one relay transmitter but would not do so again.
“Thus, the base station in the village of Tonezh may be the very one Oleksandr Syrskyi referred to on June 29,” Flagštok suggested.
The outlet added that this is not the only possible location where relay transmitters may have been disabled. It has also received information about damage to a tower in Loyeu on the evening of June 24. In addition, there were reports that a tower in the village of Parechcha in the Pinsk District had been blown up, although the exact date of that incident remains unknown.
