Russia exposes itself to “serious consequences“if it uses nuclear weapons in its war once morest Ukraine, which it invaded at the end of February, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg warned Friday during a press conference. request for an accelerated accession to the North Atlantic Alliance, formulated by the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, the Norwegian has not advanced too much.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeated on several occasions that he would not hesitate to use “all his means“of defence, including nuclear, in order to”protect“, raising fears of the use of nuclear weapons. For the head of NATO, this nuclear rhetoric is dangerous. “Moscow must understand that a nuclear war is never won“, he underlined, adding that Russia exposed itself to “serious consequences” if it still used nuclear weapons. In his speech, which came following Vladimir Putin’s annexation ceremony of four territories in eastern Ukraine in the presence of their pro-Russian leaders, Jens Stoltenberg said described these annexations as “territorial grabs“.
“These lands belong to Ukraine“, he insisted. “This is the second time that Russia has forcibly seized Ukrainian territory.“, he added, in reference to Crimea, a peninsula in the south of Ukraine annexed in 2014. Asked regarding the request for accelerated membership of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization issued by Ukraine , the Secretary General of NATO replied that “every European democracy has the right to apply for NATO membership“. “We support Ukraine’s right to choose its own path“, he continued, before slipping that a decision to this effect required unanimity among the 30 member states. For the head of the Alliance, the latter are currently concentrating on the delivery of aid to Ukraine.
