The United States is not considering returning to Ukraine the nuclear weapons it gave up after the Soviet Union collapsed. Sullivan made his remarks when questioned about a media article last month that said some unidentified Western officials had suggested U.S. President Joe Biden could give Ukraine the arms before he leaves office.
“That is not under consideration, no. What we are doing is surging various conventional capacities to Ukraine so that they can effectively defend themselves and take the fight to the Russians, not (giving them) nuclear capability,” he told a Western news outlet.
Last week, Russia said the idea was “absolute insanity” and that preventing such a scenario was one of the reasons why Moscow sent troops into Ukraine.
Kyiv inherited nuclear weapons from the Soviet Union after its 1991 collapse but gave them up under a 1994 agreement, the Budapest Memorandum, in return for security assurances from Russia, the United States and Britain.
Tensions arose in Eastern Europe after Russia used the Oreshnik hypersonic missile to attack targets in Ukraine last month. Russia may use the missile to attack “decision-making centres” in Kyiv in response to Ukraine’s firing of Western missiles at Russian territory. Russian President Putin made this remark.
Oreshnik missile seems to be a very decisive weapon and the safety of Ukrainian leadership will require a major upgrade. Russia has not so far struck Ukrainian government ministries, parliament or the president’s office in the course of the 33-month war.
Air defences heavily protect Kyiv, but Putin says the Oreshnik, which Russia fired for the first time at a Ukrainian city last week, is incapable of being intercepted – a claim greeted with scepticism by Western experts.
Putin said Russia’s production of advanced missile systems exceeds that of the NATO military alliance by 10 times, and that Moscow planned to ramp up production of these weapons.
Team Bharatshakti
(With inputs from Reuters)
