KIEV, Ukraine (AP) – Ukraine’s government on Sunday convened an emergency UN Security Council meeting to “counter the Kremlin’s nuclear blackmail” after Russian President Vladimir Putin announced plans to station tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus.
A Ukrainian official said Russia “took Belarus as a nuclear hostage”.
Another escalation in tensions, an explosion deep inside Russia injured three people on Sunday. Russian authorities blamed a Ukrainian drone for the blast, which damaged residential buildings in a town just 175 kilometers south of Moscow.
Russia said the plan to station tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus was in response to increasing Western military support for Ukraine. Putin announced the plan in a TV interview that aired on Saturday, saying it was prompted by a decision by the UK last week to supply Ukraine with armor-piercing depleted uranium shells.
Putin argued that Russia was following the lead of the United States in stationing its tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus. He pointed out that Washington has nuclear weapons in Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Turkey.
“We’re doing what they’ve been doing for decades, deploying them to certain allied countries, preparing the launch pads and training their crews,” he said.
Ukraine’s foreign ministry condemned the move in a statement on Sunday and called for an emergency UN Security Council meeting.
“Ukraine expects effective measures to counter the Kremlin’s nuclear blackmail by the UK, China, the US and France,” the statement read, saying those countries “have a special responsibility” in relation to the have nuclear aggression.
“The world must unite against anyone who threatens the future of human civilization,” the statement said.
Ukraine did not comment on Sunday’s blast in Russia. According to media reports, it left a crater about 15 meters in diameter and five meters deep.
Russian state news agency Tass reported that authorities had identified the drone as a Ukrainian Tu-141. The Soviet-era drone was reintroduced in Ukraine in 2014 and has a range of about 1,000 kilometers (620 miles).
The explosion occurred in the city of Kireyevsk, Tula region, about 300 kilometers from the border with Ukraine. The Russian Defense Ministry said the drone crashed after an electronic jamming system disabled its navigation.
Similar drone strikes were common throughout the war, though Ukraine hardly ever acknowledges responsibility. On Monday, Russia said Ukrainian drones had attacked civilian facilities in the town of Dzhankoi in Russia-annexed Crimea. The Ukrainian military said several Russian cruise missiles were destroyed, but did not specifically claim responsibility.
In December, the Russian military reported several Ukrainian drone strikes on long-range bomber bases deep in Russia. The Russian Defense Ministry said the drones were shot down but acknowledged their debris damaged some planes and killed several soldiers.
Russian authorities have also reported attacks by small drones in the Bryansk and Belgorod regions on the border with Ukraine.
On Saturday, Putin argued that Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko had long asked for nuclear weapons to be returned to his country to counter NATO. Belarus borders three NATO members – Latvia, Lithuania and Poland – and Russia used Belarusian territory as a base to deploy troops to neighboring Ukraine on February 24, 2022.
Both Lukashenko’s support for the war and Putin’s plans to deploy tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus have been denounced by the Belarusian opposition.
Oleksiy Danilov, the secretary of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council, tweeted on Sunday that Putin’s announcement was “a step towards internal destabilization” of Belarus, “reducing the level of negative perception and public resentment” towards Russia and Putin in the country Belarusian society. The Kremlin, added Danilov, “took Belarus as a nuclear hostage”.
Tactical nuclear weapons are intended for use on the battlefield and have a short range and low yield compared to much more powerful nuclear warheads attached to long-range missiles. Russia plans to retain control over those it sends to Belarus and construction of storage facilities for them will be completed by July 1, Putin said.
Russia has stored its tactical nuclear weapons in special depots on its territory, and moving part of the arsenal to a storage facility in Belarus would increase deployment in the Ukraine conflict by placing it closer to Russian planes and missiles already stationed there.
The US said it would “monitor” the impact of Putin’s announcement. So far, Washington has “seen no sign that Russia is preparing to use a nuclear weapon,” said Adrienne Watson, spokeswoman for the National Security Council.
In Germany, the Foreign Office spoke of a “further attempt at nuclear intimidation,” the German news agency dpa reported late Saturday. “President Putin’s comparison with NATO’s nuclear involvement is misleading and cannot be used to justify the move announced by Russia,” the ministry said.
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Kirsten Grieshaber contributed to this report from Berlin.