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In an interview broadcast on February 26, Russian President Vladimir Putin accused NATO of intervening in the war he ordered against Ukraine a year ago, due to the Western supply of weapons to the attacked nation. In addition, the Kremlin leader once again put his nuclear threat on the table, after pointing out alleged risks to the security of his country. Meanwhile, Moscow and kyiv are locked in a crossover over control of the eastern village of Yahidne.
Moscow raises its anger against NATO. Russian President Vladimir Putin accused the North Atlantic Treaty Organization of participating in the conflict in Ukraine by donating weapons for the defense of the attacked country.
“It’s not just technical-military cooperation. Do they receive money? No, they don’t!” said the president during an interview broadcast on Sunday, February 26.
According to the man who ordered the war against his neighboring country a year ago, the aid of Western military equipment to Kiev is “indirect complicity with the crimes of the Kiev regime, including the bombing of residential neighborhoods.”
The Kremlin leader’s remarks come amid increasing cooperation from the United States, members of the European Union and NATO to help the invaded country without directly intervening on the battlefield.
Among the measures, Washington recently announced the delivery of an additional 500 million dollars to kyiv and last January the political-military alliance agreed to send Leopard2 tanks. However, the Western allies are still refraining from going further with the supply of fighter jets, as urged by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, amid fears it would amplify Putin’s fury and worsen the conflict.
Putin: Russia “cannot ignore the nuclear capabilities of the West”
The man who has governed Russian territory for the longest time and has made clear his ambitions to take over former territories of the former Soviet Union, once again put his nuclear threat on the table.
This time he maintained that his government is attentive to NATO’s atomic potential, after referring to alleged threats against his territory.
“In the current conditions, when all the major NATO countries have declared that their main objective is to inflict a strategic defeat on us, so that our people suffer as they say, how can we ignore their nuclear capabilities in these conditions?” in the statements he gave to Rossiya state television and collected by the Tass agency.
However, the West has not ruled in this regard and throughout the conflict the Kremlin has issued several warnings with its nuclear forces, the most powerful in the world after those of the United States.
On February 22, the Russian Parliament ratified Putin’s decision to suspend his participation in New START, the treaty between Washington and Moscow that limits the atomic capacity of the two powers to 1,550 nuclear warheads.
A decision that increases the risk of an eventual nuclear escalation given the lack of mutual controls that the suspension implies. Joe Biden’s government responded that it would continue to respect the pact, despite the Russian withdrawal.
A day later, on February 23, the Kremlin leader increased his threat by announcing the deployment this year of Sarmat-type super-heavy intercontinental missiles, known as “Satan II.” In addition, to reactivate its nuclear forces with new equipment based on land, sea and air.
But Putin insisted this Sunday that the Western allies want to “liquidate Russia (…) They have one goal: to dissolve the former Soviet Union and its fundamental part: the Russian Federation. And then, perhaps, they will welcome us into the so-called family of civilized peoples, but each piece separately”, in order “to be able to control it”, he said.
Exchange of information between kyiv and Moscow on the control of Yahidne
As Putin increases his threats, fighting continues on the ground. In the last 24 hours, the Ukrainian army and the invading troops, backed by the Wagner mercenary group, have issued statements in which each side claims to be in control of Yahidne, a village in eastern Ukraine.
The questioned paramilitary group claimed to have captured the town, located north of Bakhmut.
“At 7:00 p.m. on February 25, assault units of the Wagner private military company gained full control of the town of Yagodnoye (Yahidne),” Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin said in a short audio message.
However, this Sunday, February 26, the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine reported that they were failed offensives by the Moscow uniformed officers.
He added that the invading troops continue to concentrate their offensive efforts along the entire Bakhmut front line, where Yahidne is located.
The area around Bakhmut, where only about 5,000 of the 70,000 pre-conflict residents remain, has experienced some of the bloodiest attrition of the invasion.
Russia has advanced in the siege of that city, but failed to capture it before last Friday, as planned, to deliver a victory to show for the first year of the biggest conflict on European soil since World War II. Scenario that leaves serious human rights violations such as executions, torture and sexual abuse, which Putin justifies as a “special military operation” to “denazify” Ukraine.
With Reuters and EFE
