These Belarusians join the fight against Russia, defying their Moscow-backed regime

https://www.npr.org/2022/05/31/ [login to see] /russia-ukraine-belarus-belarusian-volunteers-poland
Inside a sunny classroom in a leafy neighborhood, a burly man in army fatigues and a black martial arts T-shirt holds up a tourniquet.

"We use this for serious gunshot and shrapnel wounds, or if we have severed limbs because of explosions," he says in Polish to about 30 men.

An interpreter repeats the instructions in Russian for the class — all men are from the former Soviet republic of Belarus. They're learning first aid before heading to Ukraine, where they will join the Kastus Kalinouski Battalion, an all-Belarusian volunteer brigade that fights alongside Ukrainian soldiers.

"We have this motto — for our and your freedom," says Pavel Kukhta, a brigade leader in charge of new recruits who says he receives 100 applications a day. "We're totally in solidarity with Ukrainian people."

Belarusians like Kukhta see Ukraine's defense against Russia as inextricably linked to Belarus' fate as a future democracy free of Kremlin influence. The idea is that Russia's defeat in Ukraine would both deal a blow to the Russian President Vladimir Putin's imperial ambitions and bring down his close ally, Belarusian leader Aleksandr Lukashenko.