"Ukraine is committed to the NPT; we do not possess, develop, or intend to acquire nuclear weapons. Ukraine works closely with the IAEA and is fully transparent to its monitoring, which rules out the use of nuclear materials for military purposes," Tykhyi said on X on Wednesday.
Earlier on Wednesday, a UK newspaper reported, citing a report prepared by Ukrainian researchers for the Defense Ministry, that Ukraine could develop a nuclear bomb within a few months if the United States reduces military aid to Kiev. The bomb could be reportedly created from plutonium obtained from spent fuel rods of nuclear reactors. According to the newspaper, similar technology was used to create the Fat Man atomic bomb, which was dropped on Nagasaki in 1945.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told the EU summit in Brussels in mid-October that Kiev would either get an invitation to NATO or a nuclear weapon. The Bild newspaper cited an unnamed Ukrainian official as saying that Ukraine could make a nuclear bomb within weeks to use it against Russia if NATO did not invite it to join the alliance.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said earlier that creating nuclear weapons in today's world is not difficult, but it remains unclear whether Ukraine is capable of doing so. He also described reports suggesting that Ukraine might acquire such weapons as another provocation. According to him, any steps in this direction by Ukraine will be met with an appropriate response, and Russia will not allow Kyiv to develop nuclear weapons under any circumstances. Furthermore, Putin assured that Moscow will monitor any attempts by Western countries to transfer such weapons to Ukraine.
At the beginning of November, Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov, head of the Russian Armed Forces' Radiation, Chemical, and Biological Defense troops, claimed that Kyiv might resort to a provocation using a "dirty bomb" to counter Moscow and its objectives in the special military operation.