(Reuters) – The Kremlin on Thursday denounced comments by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in which he suggested NATO should launch preventive strikes to rule out any Russian use of nuclear weapons, RIA news agency said.
“Such statements are nothing other than an appeal to start yet another world war with unpredictable, monstrous consequences,” RIA cited Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov as saying.
In a discussion with the Lowy Institute, an Australian think tank, Zelenskiy said he believed strikes were necessary to preclude any use of nuclear weapons. He did not go into detail about what kind of strikes he meant and made no reference to any need for nuclear strikes.
“What should NATO do? Make it impossible for Russia to use nuclear weapons,” he said in remarks posted in an online video.
“What is important, I once again appeal to the international community … preventive strikes so that (the Russians) know what will happen to them if they use them (nuclear weapons).”
(Reporting by Reuters; editing by David Ljunggren, Leslie Adler and Andrew Heavens)
