Putin warns Finland, Sweden over NATO as Ukraine braces for eastern assault
KYIV, Ukraine — President Vladimir Putin said on Monday Sweden and Finland joining NATO would be no threat to Russia but warned the Western alliance that moving troops or weapons into the Nordic neighbours would provoke a "response."
With Moscow pressing its assault in eastern border regions of Ukraine nearly three months into its invasion, Helsinki and Stockholm are poised to give up decades of military non-alignment over fears they could be next.
Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson confirmed on Monday her country would apply to join NATO, a day after Finland — which shares a 1,300-kilometre (800-mile) border with Russia — said the same.
Putin, whose war has sparked global outrage, killing thousands, said the move poses "no direct threat for us... but the expansion of military infrastructure to these territories will certainly provoke our response."
The Russian leader's more moderate reaction marked a contrast with comments earlier Monday from deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov, who called the expansion a "grave mistake with far-reaching consequences".
The move is not a done deal in any case, with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Monday confirming his country's intention to block the applications, accusing Finland and Sweden of harbouring terror groups, including outlawed Kurdish militants.
Sweden and Finland have failed to respond positively to Turkey's 33 extradition requests over the past five years, justice ministry sources told the official Anadolu news agency on Monday.
Any membership bid must be unanimously approved by NATO's 30 nations.
But US Secretary of State Antony Blinken voiced confidence Sunday that Sweden and Finland would join NATO despite Turkey's opposition.
Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu will meet Blinken in Washington on Wednesday, where Ankara's objections are expected to figure high on the agenda.
Kharkiv battles
Despite the resources of its giant neighbour, Ukraine has managed to repel Russian forces for longer than many expected, fortified by weapons and cash from Kyiv's Western allies.
Ukraine's defence ministry announced its troops had regained control of territory on the Russian border near the country's second-largest city of Kharkiv, which has been under constant attack.
Since failing to take the capital Kyiv in the early weeks of the war, Moscow is focusing on Donbas, a region near the Russian border that is home to pro-Russian separatists.
Presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovich told local television Sunday that Russian troops were being redeployed to take Severodonetsk, the easternmost city still held by Ukraine.
Its occupation would grant the Kremlin de facto control of Lugansk, one of two regions — along with Donetsk — that comprise Donbas.
But Russia's attempt to encircle the city of 100,000 has been repelled with heavy equipment losses, while Russian-occupied railway bridges were blown up, Ukrainian officials said.
Russia continued strikes on Lugansk, killing two people and wounding nine during shelling of a Severodonetsk hospital, the Ukrainian presidency said Monday.
A further 10 people were killed by Russian strikes on Severodonetsk, according to the local governor.
Police in neighbouring Donetsk said six civilians were killed and 12 wounded in Russian shelling over the past 24 hours.
Six million refugees have fled Ukraine since the war began, and another eight million have been internally displaced, according to UN agencies.
But some are trying to wait it out.
'Time is running out'
In Lysychansk, on the other side of the river from Severodonetsk, a policeman tried in vain to evacuate Angelina Abakumova and her children.
"It is dangerous here now. Then it changes and it becomes dangerous over there. What is the point of going back and forth?" she told AFP, on her way back to her basement.
One of the war's most symbolic battles has been the fight for Mariupol, the southern port that has largely fallen to Russian forces.
Russia said Monday it had reached a deal to evacuate wounded soldiers from the city's Azovstal steel plant, where hundreds remain holed up in underground tunnels, although there was no immediate confirmation from Ukraine.
Meanwhile EU foreign ministers met in Brussels to discuss a ban on Russian oil — proposed as part of an unprecedented economic sanctions on Moscow but being blocked by Hungary over the economic cost.
"We are unhappy with the fact that the oil embargo is not there," Ukraine's top diplomat Dmytro Kuleba said afterwards.
"It's clear who's holding up the issue. But time is running out because every day Russia keeps making money and investing this money into the war."
The war meanwhile is taking its toll on the continent's growth. The European Commission sharply cut its eurozone forecast for 2022 to 2.7 percent, blaming skyrocketing energy prices.
Separately, French automaker Renault has handed over its Russian assets to Moscow, while US fast food giant McDonald's announced it would be pulling out, citing the "humanitarian crisis caused by the war." — with Dmitry ZAKS in Lysychansk and Elias HUUHTANEN in Helsinki
President Volodymyr Zelensky on Saturday secured Turkey's crucial backing for Ukraine's NATO aspirations after winning a US pledge for cluster munitions that could inflict massive damage on Russian forces on the battlefield.
Washington's decision to deliver the controversial weapons — banned across a large part of the world but not in Russia or Ukraine — dramatically ups the stakes in the war, which entered its 500th day Saturday.
Zelensky has been travelling across Europe trying to secure bigger and better weapons for his outmatched army, which has launched a long-awaited counteroffensive that is progressing less swiftly than Ukraine's allies had hoped. — AFP
Washington's decision to supply Ukraine with ATACMS long-range missiles is "a grave mistake", Russian ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov says Wednesday.
"The White House's decision to send long-range missiles to Ukrainians is a grave mistake. The consequences of this step, which was deliberately hidden from the public, will be of the most serious nature," he says in a statement. — AFP
President Vladimir Putin says Sunday that Russian forces had made gains in their Ukraine offensive including in Avdiivka, a symbolic industrial hub.
"Our troops are improving their position in almost all of this area, which is quite vast," he says in an interview on Russian television, an extract of which was posted on social media on Sunday. "This concerns the areas of Kupiansk, Zaporizhia and Avdiivka." — AFP
The regional governor says debris from a drone destroyed over the Russian region of Belgorod, which borders Ukraine, fell on homes and killed three people, including a young child.
The air defense system "shot down an aircraft-type UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) approaching the city", says Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov, adding that the falling debris destroyed several homes.
"Most importantly, three people were killed, one of them a small child," he writes on the Telegram messaging app, accompanied by pictures of a house reduced to a pile of rubble behind red and white police tape. — AFP
Ukraine's air force says on Tuesday that it had destroyed 27 of 36 Russian attack drones overnight in the south of the country.
Ukrainian forces downed 27 "Shahed-136/131" drones in the southern Kherson, Mykolaiv and Odesa regions, the air force said on the messaging platform Telegram.
In all, Moscow had launched 36 of the Iranian-made drones from the Crimean peninsula, which Moscow annexed in 2014, it says. — AFP
The Kremlin claims on Friday Russian forces never targeted civilian infrastructure after Ukraine blamed Moscow for a missile attack that killed over 50 people in the eastern village of Groza.
"We repeat that the Russian military does not strike civilian targets. Strikes are carried out on military targets, on places where military personnel are concentrated," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov says in his daily briefing. — AFP
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