- Russia warns the United States not to arm Ukraine
- The United States is considering howitzer ammunition, tanks and grenade launchers
- The United Kingdom to send ambulances, fire trucks and medical supplies
LVIV, Ukraine / Kyiv, April 26 (Reuters) – Russia has told the world not to underestimate the significant risks of nuclear war it says it wants to reduce, and warned that conventional Western weapons were legitimate targets in Ukraine, where battles were raging in the east. .
“Now the risks are significant,” Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told Russian state television, according to a transcript of an interview on the ministry’s website.
“I do not want to increase these risks artificially. Many would like that. The danger is serious, real. And we should not underestimate it.
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Lavrov was asked about the importance of avoiding World War III and whether the current situation is comparable to the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, a low point in US-Soviet relations.
Russia has lost “its last hope of scaring the world not to support Ukraine,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba wrote on Twitter after Lavrov’s interview. “It simply means that Moscow is losing.
During a visit to Kyiv, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin pledged more military aid to Ukraine.
But Moscow’s ambassador to Washington told the United States to cut off supplies, warning that Western weapons were fueling the conflict. Read more
Lavrov said: “NATO is essentially waging war with Russia through a proxy and arming this proxy. War means war.”
Russia’s two-month invasion of Ukraine, the largest attack on a European country since 1945, has left thousands dead or wounded, turning cities into ruins and forcing more than 5 million people to flee abroad.
Moscow called its actions a “special operation” to disarm Ukraine and protect it from the Nazis. Ukraine and the West say this is a false pretext for an unprovoked aggressive war by President Vladimir Putin.
Russia has not yet conquered any of the largest cities. His forces were forced to withdraw from the outskirts of Kyiv in the face of fierce resistance.
“Obviously, every day – and especially today, when the third month of our resistance began – everyone in Ukraine is concerned about peace, about when it will be over,” President Vladimir Zelensky said late Monday.
“There’s no simple answer to that right now.”
The US State Department on Monday used a state of emergency to approve the potential sale of $ 165 million worth of ammunition to Ukraine. The Pentagon said the package could include artillery ammunition for howitzers, tanks and grenade launchers. Read more
The United States is due to host an expected gathering of more than 40 countries this week for Ukraine-related defense talks that will focus on arming Kyiv, US officials said.
Britain says all tariffs on goods entering the country from Ukraine under an existing free trade deal will be removed and new ambulances, fire trucks, medical supplies and funding for health experts will be sent to help emergency services .
Putin said on Monday that the West had failed to divide Russian society and accused him of inciting Kyiv to plan attacks on Russian journalists, in comments rejected by Ukraine’s security service.
Just weeks ago, the capital, Kyiv, was a front-line city under curfew and bombing, with tens of thousands of soldiers on the northern outskirts and residents hiding from artillery at metro stations.
Today, Russia’s closest troops are hundreds of miles away, and normal life is returning to the capital, with Western leaders visiting and diplomats returning.
Blinken said US diplomats would first come to the western city of Lviv and should return to Kyiv within weeks. Bridget Brink, now the US ambassador to Slovakia, will be an envoy. Read more
But far from the capital, war is raging in eastern and southern Ukraine, where Russia launched a massive offensive last week.
Russia’s defense ministry says its missiles have destroyed six facilities feeding railways that were used to supply foreign weapons to Ukrainian forces in the eastern Donbass region. Reuters could not verify the report. Read more
Russian forces continued to bomb and shell the huge Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol on Monday, where fighters are trapped in a city ravaged by siege and bombing, said Ukrainian presidential aide Alexei Arestovich.
Moscow said it was opening a humanitarian corridor to release civilians from the plant, but Kyiv said no agreement had been reached and called on the UN to help achieve one such as “initiator and guarantor”. Read more
Russia’s Defense Ministry said Ukraine had undermined evacuation efforts and that no one had left the steel plant through humanitarian corridors on Monday.
Russia’s deputy ambassador to the UN, Dmitry Polyansky, told reporters that a ceasefire was not a good option and would only allow Ukrainian forces to regroup, although that was not his decision.
The General Staff of Ukraine also reported Russian shelling of the second largest city in the northeast of Kharkiv, as well as towns and villages in the south, but said attacks on three settlements had been repulsed.
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Additional reports from Reuters journalists; writing by Costas Pitas; edited by Cynthia Osterman and Rosalba O’Brien
Our standards: Thomson Reuters’ principles of trust.
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