Russian President Vladimir Putin said last week that he was planning to station tactical nuclear weapons in neighbouring Belarus and that Minsk would have a storage facility for Russian nuclear weapons ready by July 1.
Addressing the UN Security Council on Friday, Poland's Krzysztof Szczerski expressed serious concern over Russia’s plans to deploy tactical nuclear weapons, and their means of delivery, to Belarus, according to reports.
The Polish UN ambassador said that such a decision "would constitute an irresponsible escalation" and would add to tensions in Europe stemming from Moscow’s aggression against Ukraine.
Further, it would pose a major risk to the integrity of the global non-proliferation system, Szczerski warned.
He told the UN Security Council that Moscow’s strategy was to intimidate, provoke and impede efforts aimed at ending its war on Ukraine.
“It is clearly the rhetoric of confrontation” as it undermines efforts to find a successful peace formula, Szczerski observed.
He also said that Russia was making efforts to “fully subordinate” Belarus and stated that it is “deplorable” that the authorities in Minsk chose to enable Moscow’s illegal war in Ukraine "in the first place," and now have decided to further pursue this role “to the detriment of the security of us all."
Szczerski appealed to all UN member states to strengthen their efforts to strengthen the non-proliferation system "despite Russia's irresponsible policy and aggressive behavior."
"These actions by Russia must not succeed," he declared. "We must prevent the risk of a nuclear apocalypse."
US President Joe Biden said earlier this week that Putin’s decision to deploy tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus was “dangerous” and “worrisome,”
Saturday is day 402 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.
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Source: IAR, PAP, press.un.org