Lavrov: Russia will not allow Ukraine to have nuclear weapons

LAST UPDATE: 13.27

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said at a disarmament conference in Geneva on Tuesday that Kyiv was seeking to acquire nuclear weapons, citing a real danger that must be averted.

“Ukraine still has Soviet technologies and the means to deliver such weapons,” Lavrov told a conference on disarmament in Geneva. “We can not fail to meet this real danger,” he said.

At the same conference, the Ukrainian Foreign Minister accused Russia of war crimes through the bombing of his country and called for a special session to deal with Russian aggression and weapons of mass destruction.

Lavrov also said the West should not build military installations in countries of the former Soviet Union. He also noted that “the time has come for US nuclear weapons to be returned to Europe and back to the United States,” according to Reuters.

Lavrov also said Russia was ready to work with the United States on strategic stability. He said it was unacceptable for Russia that some European countries were hosting US nuclear weapons.

Russia’s Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, meanwhile, has said Russia will continue its military operation in Ukraine until it achieves its goals, Interfax news agency reported on Tuesday.

Shoigu said Moscow’s main goal is to protect it from Western threats, and noted that Russia does not occupy Ukrainian territory.

Kremlin: We will not succumb to Western sanctions on Ukraine

Western sanctions will never force Russia to change its position on Ukraine, the Kremlin said on Tuesday, according to Reuters.

Responding to a barrage of Western sanctions over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peshkov said: “They think they will force us to change our position. That is out of the question.”

Peshkov told reporters that Russian President Vladimir Putin was briefed on the first round of talks between Russian and Ukrainian delegates on Monday, but it was too early to judge the outcome.

There are no plans for talks between Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, he said, adding that Moscow still recognizes Zelensky as Ukraine’s leader.

Zelensky, he said, could have prevented further losses if he had ordered the weapons to be dropped.

Ukraine has refused to surrender and its forces have strongly resisted Russia’s attack from the north, east and south, which Moscow describes as a special operation to demilitarize and “de-Nazify” the country – a justification that rejected by Kyiv and the West as war propaganda.

Peshkov dismissed allegations of Russian strikes on civilian targets and the use of cluster munitions as fake. He categorically denied that Russia had committed war crimes.

Ukraine says large numbers of civilians have been killed. Peshkov said, without providing evidence, that Ukrainian nationalist groups were using people as human shields.

Peshkov declined to comment on whether the Kremlin considered Kyiv to be under Nazi control, referring the question to the Russian military.