Ukraine and its western allies are mostly reacting calmly to the planned stationing of Russian nuclear weapons in their friendly neighbor Belarus. NATO said on Sunday that the alliance sees no need for action with regard to its own nuclear weapons. After the announcement by Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin, however, one is vigilant and is monitoring the situation closely, said a spokeswoman.
Adviser to the presidential office in Kyiv Mykhailo Podoliak said that by making the announcement, Putin was admitting that he was afraid of losing his war of aggression against Ukraine. “Putin is so predictable,” he said of his nuclear plans. In addition, Putin confirmed once again that he was involved in crimes because he was now violating the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.
The Foreign Office in Berlin spoke of a “further attempt at nuclear intimidation”. However, NATO has “long since adjusted to the announcements,” said CDU foreign policy expert Roderich Kiesewetter to the editorial network Germany. The chairman of the Europe Committee in the Bundestag, Anton Hofreiter (Greens), told the newspapers of the Funke media group: “Nuclear threats have been part of the Kremlin’s repertoire since the beginning of the Russian war of aggression.”
Putin announced on state television on Saturday that he would station tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus – partly on the grounds that the United States also had such weapons in its European allies, such as Germany. This justification was rejected in the Foreign Office.
According to Putin, weapons training in Belarus should begin in April, and the depots for the nuclear missiles should be ready on July 1st. In Belarus, the ruler Alexander Lukashenko, who is dependent on Putin, had called for the weapons to be stationed even before the war. After the voluntary surrender of its nuclear weapons following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Belarus received nuclear missiles for the first time since the 1990s.
However, from the point of view of the Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), the Russian actions could lead to catastrophe. Putin’s plan is an “extremely dangerous escalation,” warned the Nobel Prize-winning organization in Geneva. Bulgaria’s Vice President Ilijana Jotova called for negotiations between the warring parties Russia and Ukraine. The situation is becoming “more and more dangerous and frightening,” Jotowa said in Sofia.
In his television appearance, Putin also announced that he would expand his own tank production in view of western tank deliveries to Ukraine. “The total number of tanks in the Russian army will exceed that of the Ukrainian army by three times, even more than three times,” he said. While Ukraine will get 420 to 440 tanks from the west, Russia will build 1,600 new tanks or modernize existing tanks.
Ex-President Dmitry Medvedev had already announced the production of 1,500 tanks this week. In an analysis by the US Institute for War Studies (ISW), however, their experts doubt this. According to this, Russia’s only tank factory Uralvagonzavod (UVZ) can only produce 20 tanks a month, but is losing many times that number every day in the war in Ukraine.
According to British intelligence services, Russia has received new drones from Iran for the war against Ukraine. After a two-week hiatus, Russia has deployed at least 71 Iranian Shahed-type kamikaze drones against Ukrainian targets since March, the Defense Ministry said in London on Sunday. This indicates that Russia is now receiving regular shipments of “a small number” of Shahed drones from Iran. The British Ministry of Defense has published daily updates on the course of the war since the beginning of the war, citing intelligence information.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy described a “complete defeat of Russia” in the war as the best “guarantee against new aggression and crises”. In an interview that appeared in the Japanese daily “Yomiuri Shimbun”, Zelenskyj dampened expectations of an imminent Ukrainian counter-offensive. This cannot begin yet because Kiev does not have enough weapons and ammunition for it. Fighting is currently concentrated in the cities of Bakhmut, Avdiivka and Wuhledar in eastern Ukraine.
