PARIS, May 9 (Reuters) – French President Emmanuel Macron said on Monday that he was in favour of a new type of “political European community” that would allow countries outside the European Union, including Ukraine and Britain, to join the “European core values.”
Speaking to the European Parliament in Strasbourg, Macron called his re-election last month a signal that the French had wanted more Europe.
But he made clear that Ukraine’s desire to join the bloc would take several years and as a result needed to be given some hope in the short-term.
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“Ukraine by its fight and its courage is already a heartfelt member of our Europe, of our family, of our union,” Macron said.
France’s President Emmanuel Macron delivers a speech during the Conference on the Future of Europe and the release of its report with proposals for reform, in Strasbourg, France, May 9, 2022. Ludovic Marin/Pool via REUTERS
“Even if we grant it candidate status tomorrow, we all know perfectly well that the process to allow it to join would take several years indeed, probably several decades.”
Rather than bringing down stringent standards to allow countries to join more quickly, Macron suggested creating a parallel entity that could appeal to countries who aspired to join the bloc or, in an apparent reference to Britain, countries which had left the union.
He said this “European political community” would be open to democratic European nations adhering to its core values in areas such as political cooperation, security, cooperation in energy, transport, investment of infrastructure or circulation of people.
“Joining it would not necessarily prejudge future EU membership,” he said. “Nor would it be closed to those who left it.”
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Reporting by Tassilo Hummel, Elizabeth Pineau; writing by John Irish
Editing by Sudip Kar-Gupta and Ingrid Melander
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FASTIV, Ukraine, May 8 (Reuters) – A salvo of missiles brought the Kremlin’s war on Ukraine to Fastiv, a quiet town abounding with flowering cherry trees and set in sweeping farmland hundreds of kilometres from the front lines.
The strike on April 28, which injured two people, hit an electrical substation that feeds power to a confluence of railway lines that forms a key hub of networks linking central Europe, Russia, and Asia.
The damage quickly was repaired, said Ukrainian officials, and a Reuters visit last week revealed no lingering impact. Trains plied between Kyiv and the southern port of Odesa, disgorging passengers into the station at Fastiv, a town of 45,000 people 75 km (45 miles) south of the capital.
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Officials said the attack was part of an escalating Russian assault on infrastructure, aimed in part at paralysing rail deliveries of Western-supplied arms and also reinforcements sustaining Ukrainian forces fighting in the east and south.
So far, Moscow’s effort has failed, making state-owned Ukrainian Railways a leading symbol of the country’s resilience.
“The longest delay we’ve had has been less than an hour,” said Oleksandr Kamyshin, 37, a former investment banker who keeps the trains running as the CEO of the railways, Ukraine’s largest employer.
“They haven’t hit a single military train.”
The Russian defences ministry has said Ukrainian facilities powering the railways have been targeted by missile strikes because trains are used to deliver foreign arms to Ukrainian forces.
The rail system is being hit not just because it is critical to military supplies, Ukrainian officials said.
Moscow’s “goal is to destroy critical infrastructure as much as possible for military, economic and social reasons,” Deputy Infrastructure Minister Yuri Vaskov said in an interview.
With Russian warships blockading Black Sea ports, downed bridges and checkpoints obstructing roadways, and a fuel crunch snarling trucking, Ukraine’s 22,000 km (14,000 miles) of track are the main lifeline of the struggling economy and a passage to the outside world.
Trains have evacuated millions of civilians fleeing to safer parts of the country or abroad.
They have begun running small grain shipments to neighbouring counties to circumvent Russia’s maritime blockade. Ukraine was the world’s fourth largest grain exporter in the 2020/21 season and exports disrupted by the war have interrupted global food chains and helped fuel worldwide inflation.
Internally, trains are distributing humanitarian aid and other cargoes. They enabled the restart of the AcelorMittal steel plant, in Kryvyi Rih, by bringing workers in and product out, said Kamyshin. They carry civilian casualties in hospital cars staffed by Doctors Without Borders.
Since Russia invaded on Feb. 24, he said, trains have distributed more than 140,000 tonnes of food and will have carried some 1 million kilos of mail for the state postal service by mid-May.
Russian attacks on some of the 1,000 stations have killed scores of civilians, including dozens killed in an attack in April in the station in the eastern city of Kramatorsk.
That has not deterred passengers.
Daily ridership has reached as many as 200,000 passengers, Kamyshin said in an interview on Saturday as he rode a train across a bridge that had been repaired after being badly damaged during Russia’s failed advance on Kyiv from the suburb of Irpin.
Nor have the railway’s 230,000 personnel stayed home even though 122 have been killed and 155 others wounded on the job and in their houses, said Kamyshin.
Moscow denies striking civilian targets in what it calls a “special military operation” to disarm Ukraine and rid it of what it calls anti-Russian nationalism fomented by the West. Ukraine and the West say Russia launched an unprovoked war of aggression.
Reuters was not able to independently verify the assertions of Kamyshin and other Ukrainian officials about their successes keeping the railways going in wartime.
Helena Muskrivska, 56, the Irpin station master, said she worked for the first four days of the Russian assault, helping evacuate some 1,000 people and relaying local developments by landline to Kyiv. She took documents and equipment home when it became too dangerous.
“I was here when the Russians came into the station. I didn’t want to see them face to face,” said Muskrivska.
A group of current and former U.S. and European railway executives formed the International Support Ukraine Rail Task Force in March to raise money for protective gear, first aid kits and financial aid for railway staff.
“There’s a lot of fundraising efforts everywhere for Ukraine, but none of it goes to the railroad,” said Jolene Molitoris, a former U.S. Federal Railroad Administration chief who chairs the group. “It is the lifeline of the country.”
The group also aims to fund purchases of heavy machinery, rails and other equipment sought by the railways.
Kamyshin said he is racing against the Russian attacks, deploying teams of workers and dispatchers around the clock to fix tracks and reroute trains. “It’s all about hours, not about days.”
He and top aides constantly move, taking trains to inspect damage and repairs around Ukraine, he said, adding: “Once they break it, we fix it”.
Kamyshin said his top priority is redirecting grain exports from Ukraine’s southern ports to Poland, Romania, and the Baltic states to help revive the economy. He said Russia would remain a threat even after what he called its inevitable defeat.
“This crazy neighbour will stay with us,” he said. “No one knows when they will come again.”
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Additional reporting by Pavel Polityuk
Editing by Frances Kerry
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Putin to lead celebrations of Soviet victory in WW2
60 killed after Russian shell hits school in Ukraine’s east
G7 says Putin’s actions ‘bring shame on Russia’
Mariupol residents evacuate, soldiers hold out in steelworks
ZAPORIZHZHIA, Ukraine, May 9 (Reuters) – Kremlin forces bombed a village school in eastern Ukraine killing about 60 people, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said, as Russia prepared to mark the Monday anniversary of the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany in World War Two.
The governor of the Luhansk region said about 90 people were sheltering at the school in Bilohorivka on Saturday when it was bombed. read more
“As a result of a Russian strike on Bilohorivka in the Luhansk region, about 60 people were killed, civilians, who simply hid at the school, sheltering from shelling,” Zelenskiy said in his nightly video address.
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There was no response from Moscow to the news.
In the southern port of Mariupol, which has endured the most destructive fighting of the 10-week war, the deputy commander of the Azov regiment holed up in the Azovstal steel plant pleaded with the international community to help evacuate wounded soldiers.
“We will continue to fight as long as we are alive to repel the Russian occupiers,” Captain Sviatoslav Palamar told an online news conference.
Leaders of the Group of Seven (G7) industrial nations vowed on Sunday to deepen Russia’s economic isolation and “elevate” a campaign against Kremlin-linked elites. read more
The G7 said it was committed to phasing out or banning Russian oil and denounced Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
“His actions bring shame on Russia and the historic sacrifices of its people,” the G7 said in a statement, referring to Soviet Russia’s role in defeating Nazi Germany 77 years ago.
Putin has repeatedly likened the war in Ukraine – which he casts as a battle against dangerous “Nazi”-inspired nationalists in Ukraine – to the challenge the Soviet Union faced when Adolf Hitler invaded in 1941.
Ukraine and its allies reject the accusation of Nazism and the assertion that Russia is fighting for survival against a aggressive West, saying Putin unleashed an unprovoked war in an attempt to rebuild the Soviet Union.
In a video address, filmed in front of charred Ukrainian apartment blocks with footage of Russian missile strikes, Zelenskiy said that evil had returned, but his country would prevail. read more
Hailing the G7 response, Zelenskiy said in his nightly video address: “The main thing I felt today was the world’s even greater willingness to help us … it is clear to the whole free world that Ukraine is the party of good in this war.”
“And Russia will lose, because evil always loses.”
Putin will preside over a parade in Moscow’s Red Square on Monday of troops, tanks, rockets and intercontinental ballistic missiles, making a speech that could offer clues to the future of the war. read more
Russia has come under increasingly punishing sanctions since Putin launched what he called a “special operation” on Feb. 24, with trade heavily impacted and assets seized.
The European Union should consider using frozen Russian foreign exchange reserves to help pay for the cost of rebuilding Ukraine after the war, foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said in an interview with the Financial Times. read more
In the Ukrainian-controlled city of Zaporizhzhia, about 230 km (140 miles) northwest of Mariupol, dozens of people who had fled the city and nearby occupied areas waited to register in a car park set up for evacuees.
“There’s lots of people still in Mariupol who want to leave but can’t,” said history teacher Viktoria Andreyeva, 46, who said she had only just reached the city after leaving her bombed home in Mariupol with her family in mid-April.
“The air feels different here, free,” she said in a tent where volunteers offered food, basic supplies and toys to the evacuees, many travelling with small children.
Separatists said a total of 408 people were evacuated from Mariupol over the past 24 hours, including 65 children.
Mariupol is key to Moscow’s efforts to link the Crimean Peninsula, seized by Russia in 2014, and parts of the eastern regions of Luhansk and Donetsk that have been controlled by Russia-backed separatists since then.
In Luhansk and Donetsk regions, half a dozen Russian attacks were repulsed, with tanks and armoured combat vehicles destroyed, Luhansk governor Serhiy Gaidai said on Monday.
Viktor Andrusiv, an adviser to the interior minister, said Ukraine was awaiting the delivery of more sophisticated weapons and expecting further attacks from Russia on Monday.
“We are preparing for rocket attacks today – please, take air alerts very responsibly today.”
A number of Western officials, including U.S. first lady Jill Biden, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, a German parliament head and the Norwegian foreign minister arrived in Ukraine on Sunday in a show of support. read more
Irish rock group U2’s frontman Bono and his bandmate The Edge performed a 40-minute concert in a metro station in Kyiv on Sunday and praised Ukrainians fighting for their freedom.
“This evening, 8th of May, shots will ring out in the Ukraine sky, but you’ll be free at last. They can take your lives, but they can never take your pride,” Bono said.
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Additional reporting by Pavel Polityuk in Kyiv, Oleksandr Kozhukhar in Lviv and Reuters bureaus; Writing by James Oliphant, Lincoln Feast and Himani Sarkar; Editing by Rob Birsel
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
Luhansk governor says Russia bombed school sheltering 90
Trapped civilians evacuated from Mariupol’s Azovstal plant
G7 leaders to talk with Zelenskiy in show of unity
KYIV, May 8 (Reuters) – As many as 60 people were feared to have been killed in the Russian bombing of a village school in the eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk, the regional governor said on Sunday.
Governor Serhiy Gaidai said Russian forces dropped a bomb on Saturday afternoon on the school in Bilohorivka where about 90 people were sheltering, causing a fire that engulfed the building.
“The fire was extinguished after nearly four hours, then the rubble was cleared, and, unfortunately, the bodies of two people were found,” Gaidai wrote on the Telegram messaging app.
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“Thirty people were evacuated from the rubble, seven of whom were injured. Sixty people were likely to have died under the rubble of buildings.”
Reuters could not immediately verify the report.
Ukraine and its Western allies have accused Russian forces of targeting civilians in the war, which Moscow denies.
In the ruined southeastern port city of Mariupol, scores of civilians have been evacuated from a sprawling steel plant in a week-long operation brokered by the United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in an address late on Saturday that more than 300 civilians had been rescued from the Azovstal steelworks and authorities would now focus on trying to evacuate the wounded and medics. Other Ukrainian sources have cited different figures.
Russian-backed separatists on Saturday reported a total of 176 civilians evacuated from the plant.
The Azovstal plant is a last hold-out for Ukrainian forces in the city now largely controlled by Russia, and many civilians had also taken refuges in its underground shelters. It has become a symbol of resistance to the Russian effort to capture swathes of eastern and southern Ukraine.
Emergency crew work near a burning debris, after a school building was hit as a result of shelling, in the village of Bilohorivka, Luhansk, Ukraine, May 8, 2022. State Emergency Services/Handout via REUTERS
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Russian President Vladimir Putin calls the invasion he launched on Feb. 24 a “special military operation” to disarm Ukraine and rid it of anti-Russian nationalism fomented by the West. Ukraine and its allies say Russia launched an unprovoked war.
Mariupol is key to blocking Ukrainian exports and linking the Crimean Peninsula, seized by Russia in 2014, and parts of the eastern regions of Luhansk and Donetsk that have been controlled by Russia-backed separatists since that same year.
In an emotional address on Sunday for Victory Day, when Europe commemorates the formal surrender of Germany to the Allies in World War Two, Zelenskiy said that evil had returned to Ukraine with the Russian invasion, but his country would prevail. read more
U.S. President Joe Biden and other G7 leaders were to hold a video call with Zelenskiy on Sunday in a show of unity ahead of Victory Day celebrations on Monday in Russia.
Underlining Western support for Ukraine, Britain pledged to provide a further 1.3 billion pounds ($1.6 billion) in military support and aid, double its previous spending commitments.
Victory Day is a major event in Russia and Putin will preside on Monday over a parade in Moscow’s Red Square of troops, tanks, rockets and intercontinental ballistic missiles, showing military might even as his forces fight on in Ukraine.
His speech could offer clues on the future of the war. Russia’s efforts have been stymied by logistical and equipment problems and high casualties in the face of fierce resistance. read more
U.S. Central Intelligence Agency Director William Burns said on Saturday that Putin was convinced “doubling down” on the conflict would improve the outcome for Russia.
“He’s in a frame of mind in which he doesn’t believe he can afford to lose,” Burns told a Financial Times event in Washington on Saturday.
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Reporting by Pavel Polityuk in Kyiv and Reuters bureaus
Writing by Michael Perry and Estelle Shirbon
Editing by William Mallard and Frances Kerry
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
‘Influential’ states working to save Azovstal fighters
Ukraine fears Russia aims to wipe out Azovstal fighters
More civilians evacuated from bombed-out steelworks
KYIV, May 7 (Reuters) – Pro-Russian forces said 50 more people were evacuated on Saturday from the besieged Azovstal steelworks in Mariupol, where scores of civilians have been trapped for weeks alongside Ukrainian fighters holed up in the Soviet-era plant.
The territorial defence headquarters of the self-declared Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) said on Telegram that a total of 176 civilians had now been evacuated from the steelworks.
Reuters could not immediately verify the report.
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About 50 civilians had been moved on Friday from the sprawling, bombed-out plant to a reception centre in nearby Bezimenne, in the separatist DPR, whose forces are fighting alongside Russian troops to expand their control of large parts of eastern Ukraine. Dozens of civilians were also evacuated last weekend.
“Today, May 7, 50 people were evacuated from the territory of the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol,” the DPR said.
Mariupol has endured the most destructive bombardment of the 10-week-old war. The plant is the last part of the city – a strategic southern port on the Azov Sea – still in the hands of Ukrainian fighters. Scores of civilians have been trapped for weeks alongside them in the plant with little food, water or medicine.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in a late-night video address on Friday that Ukraine was working on a diplomatic effort to save defenders barricaded inside the steelworks. It was unclear how many Ukrainian fighters remained there.
“Influential intermediaries are involved, influential states,” he said, but provided no further details.
The defenders have vowed not to surrender. Ukrainian officials fear Russian forces want to wipe them out by Monday, in time for Moscow’s commemorations of the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany in World War Two. read more
Evacuations of civilians from the Azovstal plant brokered by the United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) began last weekend. But they were halted during the week by renewed fighting.
The city’s mayor estimated earlier this week that 200 people were trapped at the plant. It was unclear how many remained.
President Vladimir Putin declared victory in Mariupol on April 21, ordered the plant sealed off and called for Ukrainian forces inside to disarm. But Russia later resumed its assault on the plant. read more
Asked about plans for Russia to mark Monday’s anniversary of the Soviet Union’s World War Two victory over Nazi Germany in parts of Ukraine it holds, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Friday “The time will come to mark Victory Day in Mariupol.”
Mariupol, which lies between the Crimea Peninsula seized by Moscow in 2014 and parts of eastern Ukraine taken by Russia-backed separatists that year, is key to linking up the two Russian-held territories and blocking Ukrainian exports.
Women evacuated from Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol are seen at a temporary accommodation centre in the village of Bezimenne, during Ukraine-Russia conflict in the Donetsk Region, Ukraine May 6, 2022. REUTERS/Alexander Ermochenko
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Ukraine’s general staff said on Saturday Russian forces were pursuing an offensive in eastern Ukraine to establish full control over the Donetsk and Luhansk regions and maintain the land corridor between these territories and Crimea.
Near Kharkiv, Russian forces continue artillery shelling of settlements near the northeastern city. They blew up three road bridges in the region in order to slow down the counter-offensive actions of the Ukrainian forces, the general staff said.
Russia said on Saturday it had destroyed a large stockpile of military equipment from the United States and European countries near the Bohodukhiv railway station in the Kharkiv region.
The defence ministry said it had hit 18 Ukrainian military facilities overnight, including three ammunition depots in Dachne, near the southern port city of Odesa.
It was not possible to independently verify either side’s statements about battlefield events.
A senior Russian commander said last month Russia planned to take full control of southern Ukraine and that this would improve Russian access to Transdniestria, a breakaway region of Moldova.
Pro-Russian separatists in Moldova said on Saturday that Transdniestria had been hit four times by suspected drones overnight near the Ukrainian border. Nearly two weeks of similar reported incidents in Transdniestria have raised international alarm that the war in Ukraine could spread over the frontier. read more
Ukraine has repeatedly denied any blame for the incidents, saying it believes Russia is staging false-flag attacks to provoke war. Moscow, too, has denied blame. read more
In the Kharkiv region, governor Oleh Sinegubov reported three shelling attacks overnight on Kharkiv city and in the village of Skovorodinyvka, which caused a fire that nearly destroyed the Hryhoriy Skovoroda Literary Memorial Museum.
Skovoroda was a philosopher and poet in the 1700s. Sinegubov said the museum’s collection was not damaged as it had been moved to a safer place.
“The occupiers can destroy the museum where Hryhoriy Skovoroda worked for the last years of his life and where he was buried. But they will not destroy our memory and our values,” Sinegubov said in a social media post.
Moscow calls its actions since Feb. 24 a “special military operation” to disarm Ukraine and rid it of what it calls anti-Russian nationalism fomented by the West.
Ukraine and the West say Russia launched an unprovoked war and have accused Russian forces of war crimes.
Moscow denies the allegations and says it targets only military or strategic sites, not civilians. More than 5 million Ukrainians have fled abroad since the start of the invasion.
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Reporting by Pavel Polityuk and Reuters bureaus; Writing by Michael Perry and William Maclean
Editing by William Mallard and Frances Kerry
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
Local residents climb on top of a destroyed Russian tank, as Russia’s attack on Ukraine continues, near Irpin, Ukraine May 6, 2022. REUTERS/Carlos Barria TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY
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May 7 (Reuters) – The conflict in Ukraine is taking a heavy toll on some of Russia’s most capable units and most advanced capabilities, the British Ministry of Defence tweeted in a regular bulletin on Saturday.
At least one T-90M, Russia’s most advanced tank, has been destroyed in the fighting, the ministry said.
Approximately 100 T-90M tanks are in service amongst Russia’s best equipped units, including those fighting in Ukraine, it said.
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Reporting by Shivam Patel in Bengaluru; Editing by William Mallard
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UNITED NATIONS, May 6 (Reuters) – The U.N. Security Council, including Russia, on Friday expressed “deep concern regarding the maintenance of peace and security of Ukraine” and backed efforts by the U.N. chief to find a peaceful solution in the body’s first statement since Moscow’s invasion.
Security Council statements are agreed by consensus. The brief text adopted on Friday was drafted by Norway and Mexico.
“The Security Council expresses deep concern regarding the maintenance of peace and security of Ukraine,” it reads. “The Security Council recalls that all Member States have undertaken, under the Charter of the United Nations, the obligation to settle their international disputes by peaceful means.”
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“The Security Council expresses strong support for the efforts of the Secretary-General in the search for a peaceful solution,” reads the statement, which also requests U.N. chief Antonio Guterres brief the council again “in due course.”
Guterres welcomed the council support on Friday, saying he would “spare no effort to save lives, reduce suffering and find the path of peace.”
Members of the United Nations Security Council sit during a meeting on the situation amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, at the United Nations Headquarters in Manhattan, New York City, New York, U.S., May 5, 2022. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton
Guterres met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Kyiv last week.
His visits paved the way for joint United Nations and International Committee of the Red Cross operations that have evacuated some 500 civilians from Ukraine’s port city of Mariupol and the besieged Azovstal steel plant in the past week.
The Security Council statement was agreed despite a diplomatic tit-for-tat that has been escalating since Russia launched on Feb. 24 what it calls a “special military operation” and what Guterres blasted as Russia’s “absurd war.”
Russia vetoed a draft Security Council resolution on Feb. 25 that would have deplored Moscow’s invasion. China, the United Arab Emirates and India abstained from the vote. A council resolution needs nine votes in favor and no vetoes by the United States, Russia, China, France or Britain to pass. read more
The 193-member U.N. General Assembly, where no country has a veto, has since overwhelmingly adopted two resolutions, illustrating Russia’s international isolation over Ukraine. Such resolutions are nonbinding, but they carry political weight.
The General Assembly has deplored Russia’s “aggression against Ukraine,” demanding both that Russian troops stop fighting and withdraw and that there be aid access and civilian protection. It also criticized Russia for creating a “dire” humanitarian situation. read more
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Reporting by Michelle Nichols; editing by Diane Craft and Rosalba O’Brien
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May 6 (Reuters) – At the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin obliquely raised the possibility of a nuclear strike against anyone who intervened in the conflict.
Below are some of the key issues surrounding the possibility – viewed as remote by many analysts and Western diplomats – that Putin might actually use nuclear weapons.
WHAT HAS RUSSIA SAID ABOUT NUCLEAR ARMS IN THE UKRAINE WAR?
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In a speech announcing the invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, Putin gave a veiled but unmistakable warning that if the West intervened in what he has called a “special military operation” he could use nuclear weapons in response.
“No matter who tries to stand in our way or … create threats for our country and our people, they must know that Russia will respond immediately, and the consequences will be such as you have never seen in your entire history,” he said according to a Kremlin translation.
Three days later on Feb. 27, Putin ordered his military command to put Russia’s nuclear deterrent forces on high alert, citing what he called aggressive statements by NATO leaders and Western economic sanctions against Moscow. read more
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, a veteran diplomat, has also talked about the risk of nuclear war, though he said Moscow was doing its utmost to prevent one.
“I would not want to elevate those risks artificially. Many would like that. The danger is serious, real. And we must not underestimate it,” he said last week, prompting the U.S. State Department to call his remarks “the height of irresponsibility”.
While Washington has not seen any actions suggesting Russian nuclear forces are on high alert, experts and Western officials warned against dismissing the comments as bluster given the risk Putin could use nuclear arms if he felt cornered in Ukraine or if NATO entered the war.
WHAT HAS THE WEST SAID ABOUT PUTIN’S VEILED THREATS?
U.S. officials quickly called Putin’s comments about putting Russian nuclear forces on high alert dangerous, escalatory and totally unacceptable, while NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg criticized them as aggressive and irresponsible.
However, U.S. officials also immediately made clear they had seen no signs Russian forces had changed their nuclear posture and the U.S. military said it saw no need to alter its own.
On Feb. 28, U.S. President Joe Biden told Americans not to worry about a nuclear war with Russia. Responding to a shouted question about whether U.S. citizens should be concerned about a nuclear war erupting, Biden said “no.” read more
WHAT ARE THE CHANCES OF RUSSIA USING NUCLEAR WEAPONS?
Biden’s comment appeared to reflect a widespread view among U.S. experts and Western officials that the chances of Russia using nuclear weapons in the Ukraine war are extremely low.
FILE PHOTO – Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting with the head of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs Alexander Shokhin in Moscow, Russia March 2, 2022. Sputnik/Mikhail Klimentyev/Kremlin via REUTERS
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“Since 1945, every leader of a nuclear power … has rejected the use of nuclear weapons in battle for excellent reasons,” Gideon Rose, the former editor of Foreign Affairs magazine, wrote last week.
“Putin will be no exception, acting not from a soft heart but a hard head. He knows that extraordinary retaliation and universal opprobrium would follow, with no remotely comparable strategic upsides to justify them,” he added.
The main aim of Russia’s elliptical threats of a nuclear strike seems to be to deter Washington and its NATO allies from direct involvement in the war, experts and Western diplomats said.
“They are not credible,” said one Western diplomat who like others spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue. “He is trying to scare the West.”
HOW MIGHT RUSSIA USE A NUCLEAR WEAPON?
While Western nations have poured arms into Ukraine since the invasion, Biden last year said putting U.S. troops on the ground in Ukraine was “not on the table.” read more
The United States and its allies have no desire to get into a conventional shooting war with Russia, let alone do anything that might spark a nuclear exchange.
If Russia were to use nuclear weapons, experts saw a range of possibilities, from a detonation over the Black Sea or an uninhabited part of Ukraine to demonstrate its capabilities to a strike against a Ukrainian military target or on a city.
However, using a nuclear weapon in Ukraine could endanger Russian troops and draw radioactive blowback on Russia itself.
HOW MIGHT THE WEST RESPOND?
Some analysts said Washington could opt for a conventional military response rather than a proportional nuclear counter-strike, which could harm U.S. allies or lead to a further nuclear escalation endangering Europe or the U.S. homeland.
“What I would suggest instead is that the United States and NATO respond with overwhelming conventional military, political and diplomatic force to further isolate Russia and to seek to end the conflict without escalation to all-out nuclear war,” said Daryl Kimball of the Arms Control Association, a nonprofit group that seeks to educate the public about arms control.
HOW MIGHT A RUSSIAN STRIKE CHANGE THE NUCLEAR LANDSCAPE?
NATO might seek to redesign its U.S.-built ballistic missile shield in Poland and Romania to shoot down Russian rockets in future. NATO has long said the current design aims to counter missiles from Iran, Syria and rogue actors in the Middle East.
It remains unclear whether a Russian strike might make other nuclear states such as India and Pakistan more likely to use such weapons. If it led to global condemnation, experts said this could reduce the chances of others using nuclear weapons.
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Reporting by Arshad Mohammed in Saint Paul, Minn. and by Robin Emmott in Brussels; Additional reporting by Sabine Siebold in Brussels; Editing by Mary Milliken and Andrew Heavens
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Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov attends an annual end-of-year news conference of Russian President Vladimir Putin, in Moscow, Russia, December 23, 2021. REUTERS/Evgenia Novozhenina
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May 6 (Reuters) – Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Friday that there was hostile rhetoric coming out of Poland, and that Warsaw could be “a source of threat”.
Poland has led calls for the EU to toughen sanctions and for the Western NATO alliance to arm Ukraine as it tries to resist Russian forces that have poured into its east.
Stanislaw Zaryn, a spokesman for the Polish security services, said that Russia has been conducting a coordinated disinformation campaign against Poland for several days, including suggestions it could be a threat to Ukraine’s territorial integrity.
“The aim of Russian actions is to create distrust between Poland and Ukraine, as well as to slander Poland and present it as a dangerous country generating conflicts in Eastern Europe,” he wrote in an emailed comment.
Polish Environment and Climate Minister Anna Moskwa said on Monday that “Poland is proud to be on Putin’s list of unfriendly countries.”
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Writing by Kevin Liffey and Anna Wlodarczak-Semczuk; Editing by Sandra Maler
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U.S. President Joe Biden enters the Rose Garden during a ceremony at the White House in Washington, U.S., March 29, 2022. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque
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WASHINGTON, May 6 (Reuters) – President Joe Biden is expected to sign a new weapons package worth at least $100 million for Ukraine as soon as later on Friday, four U.S. officials told Reuters, the latest in a series of transfers to help Kyiv repel Russia’s invasion.
The United States has rushed $3.4 billion worth of armaments to Ukraine since Russia invaded on Feb. 24, including howitzers, anti-aircraft Stinger systems, anti-tank Javelin missiles, ammunition and recently-disclosed “Ghost” drones.
The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the latest package would likely include more munitions for systems such as the howitzers. The Pentagon says it has already sent about 184,000 artillery rounds.
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The announcement could come as early as within the next 24 hours, two of the officials said.
The new tranche of weapons transfers would come from the remaining $250 million in the Presidential Drawdown Authority, which allows the president to authorize the transfer of excess weapons from U.S. stocks without congressional approval in response to an emergency.
Last month Biden proposed a $33 billion assistance package for Ukraine, including more than $20 billion in military aid.
The United States has been training some Ukrainian forces on how to use systems like the howitzers, outside Ukraine.
Group of Seven (G7) leaders including Biden will hold a video call on Sunday with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in a show of unity the day before Russia marks its Victory Day holiday, the White House said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin casts the war in Ukraine as a battle to protect Russian speakers there from persecution by Nazis and to guard against what he calls the U.S. threat to Russia posed by NATO enlargement.
Ukraine and the West reject the fascism claim as baseless and say Putin is waging an unprovoked war of aggression.
Ukraine and its allies say that after failing to seize the capital, Kyiv, Russian forces have made slow progress in their goal of capturing the country’s east and south but bombardments have affected more and more civilians.
Russia denies the allegations and says it targets only military or strategic sites, not civilians.
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Reporting by Idrees Ali, Patricia Zengerle and Mike Stone; Additional reporting by Steve Holland and Humeyra Pamuk; Editing by Diane Craft and Daniel Wallis
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