Top Russian Diplomat in US Urges West to Stop Funneling Weapons to Ukraine
14:51 GMT 09.04.2022 (Updated: 15:03 GMT 09.04.2022)
© AP Photo / Vadim Ghirda
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MOSCOW (Sputnik) - Russian Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov has warned that a flow of weapons to the conflict zone in Ukraine from the West was adding fuel to the fire.
"It is extremely important that Western countries stop adding fuel to the fire by pumping Kiev’s regime with weapons," he told a virtual conference held by the Schiller Institute, a German think tank.
The ambassador added that Russia will not tolerate Ukrainian troops killing civilians or torturing Russian soldiers.
“There is an obvious need for the US and their allies to urge Ukraine to respect international humanitarian law. We will never tolerate the shooting of civilians as well as the killing and torturing of captured Russian soldiers,” he said.
According to Antonov, the objective of the Russian military operation in Ukraine is to demilitarise it to make sure that it poses no threat to Russia.
"Today it is extremely important to achieve demilitarisation and denazification of Ukraine, to consolidate Ukraine’s nuclear-free status and its commitment to international agreements on the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction," he said.
"There should be no threats to the Russian Federation coming from the Ukrainian territory. This is the objective of our special military operation," Antonov added.
"Today it is extremely important to achieve demilitarisation and denazification of Ukraine, to consolidate Ukraine’s nuclear-free status and its commitment to international agreements on the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction," he said.
"There should be no threats to the Russian Federation coming from the Ukrainian territory. This is the objective of our special military operation," Antonov added.
On 24 February, the Russian army and militia forces from the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics launched a special military operation in Ukraine, aimed at "demilitarising and denazifying" the country following a breakdown of negotiations and months of escalating tensions in the region, marked by intensifying shelling by the Ukrainian army, which led to numerous civilian casualties in the Donbass republics. The Russian Defence Ministry repeatedly stressed that its army is doing everything possible to avoid victims among civilians and is using high-precision weapons only against Ukraine's military infrastructure.
The US and its allies in NATO and worldwide accused Russia of "invading" Ukraine and came up with several packages of unprecedented sanctions, mostly targeting Russia's economic and defence sectors.
