Who is behind ‘Black Rus,’ the mysterious group claiming responsibility for an armed incursion into Latvia from Belarus?

A group calling itself “Black Rus” (Chyornye Rusy) has claimed responsibility for an incident on the Latvia-Belarus border in which armed, masked men threatened Latvian soldiers overnight on October 6.

The men, who were accompanying a group of migrants, later crossed from Belarus into Latvia, damaged an electrical distribution panel, stole surveillance cameras, and returned to Belarus.

LSM reported on October 12 that a video statement on the group’s behalf had been posted on a Telegram channel. In it, a man with his face covered and his voice altered says:

Experts interviewed by Latvian journalists called Black Rus “a project of the intelligence services.” Among other things, they said such a group could not exist in either Russia or Belarus without the authorities’ knowledge.

Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko said Latvia itself had orchestrated the border incident to “get money from the European Union.” He said the Belarusian authorities had nothing to do with it.

“Operations like this, involving entry into a neighboring country, are impossible without the president’s approval. Nothing like this was cleared with me. That means no such operations took place. I know that for a fact,” Lukashenko said, according to Belarus’ state news agency BelTA.

Latvia and other European countries bordering Belarus have repeatedly blamed Minsk for the migration crisis. They believe the Belarusian authorities are behind attempts by groups of migrants to cross the border illegally and enter the EU. Minsk denies this.

Latvian Interior Minister Janis Dombrava said about 12,000 people attempting to cross illegally from Belarus had been prevented from entering Latvia since the start of 2026 under Operation Werewolf (Vilkatis). He also said several incidents involving damage to surveillance equipment on the Latvian side of the border had been recorded, Delfi reported. Dombrava suggested that Russian or Belarusian intelligence services were responsible but emphasized that this was only a theory and that there was no evidence yet.