RUSSIA’S NUCLEAR DOCTRINE
Zelenskyy said that last week alone Russia had used 160 missiles, 780 guided aerial bombs and 400 attack drones against cities and troops across Ukraine.
He called on Telegram for “a decision on long-range strikes on missile launch sites from Russia, destruction of Russian military logistics, joint shooting down of missiles and drones”.
Kyiv’s allies are wary of how Russian President Vladimir Putin would respond should their weapons be used against targets far inside Russian territory.
Russia’s TASS state news cited Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov as saying that Moscow would change its nuclear doctrine in response to the West’s actions over the conflict in Ukraine. He did not specify what the changes would entail.
Russia’s existing nuclear doctrine, set out in a decree by Putin in 2020, says it may use nuclear weapons in the event of a nuclear attack by an enemy or a conventional attack that threatens the existence of the state.
Russia, which accuses the West of using Ukraine as a proxy to wage war against it, has said before that it is considering changes.
“The work is at an advanced stage, and there is a clear intent to make corrections”, TASS cited Ryabkov as saying.
Some hawks among Russia’s military analysts have urged Putin to lower the threshold for nuclear use in order to “sober up” Russia’s enemies in the West.
In eastern Ukraine, where the heaviest fighting of the war is concentrated, Russian forces continued to advance towards Pokrovsk, which is a vital military hub and transport link to towns and cities further north.
Ukraine had hoped that its surprise incursion into Russia’s Kursk region launched last month would force Russia to re-deploy troops and take the pressure off besieged forces in the east, but so far it does not appear to have had the desired effect.
Russia’s defence ministry said on Sunday its forces had captured two more settlements in Donetsk region and were “continuing to advance deep into the enemy defences”. One of them, Ptyche, is just 21km southeast of Pokrovsk.
At least three people were killed and nine wounded in Russian shelling of Kurakhove, a town around 35km south of Pokrovsk, Ukrainian officials said.
Ukraine’s top commander Oleksandr Syrskyi said the situation was “difficult” around Russia’s main line of attack in eastern Ukraine.
Source: CNA
