NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has convened a meeting of the NATO-Ukraine Council for Tuesday. The background to the special summit is the deployment of a new Russian medium-range missile. Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin recently openly threatened the West with rocket attacks.
According to an alliance spokesperson, the meeting in Brussels will specifically address the recent Russian attack on the Ukrainian city of Dnipro. Russia fired the new intermediate-range missile ‘Oreshnik’ on Thursday morning. Military observers consider this an intimidation tactic.
Guessing about new rocket
According to Russian information, it can fly at hypersonic speeds and cannot be intercepted. Experts assume that in theory it could also be equipped with nuclear explosives. The word “Oreschnik” means nut bush. There is still a lot of guesswork about the exact properties of the new intermediate-range missile.
Six individual nuclear warheads are said to have hit Dnipro on Thursday. They were not nuclear in nature, Russian leader Putin said. The Pentagon assumes that the medium-range ballistic missile is based on the model of the Russian intercontinental ballistic missile RS-26.
According to the alliance, the consultation in Brussels is being organized at the request of the government in Kiev and will take place at ambassadorial level. The NATO-Ukraine Council met for the first time last year during the NATO summit in Lithuania at the level of heads of state and government. The relatively new committee was established for exchanges in crisis situations.
It should also allow for closer cooperation until the conditions for Ukraine’s accession to NATO are met. These include an end to Russia’s war of aggression and reforms in Ukraine.
The use of Western weapons against targets in Russia caused an angry reaction in Moscow. In a televised speech, Putin urged Ukraine’s allies to exercise restraint. As a result of the West’s abolition of territorial borders, the conflict in Ukraine has, in Putin’s words, now acquired “elements of a global character.”
Scholz hits the brakes
In contrast to the US, Great Britain and France, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz is putting on the brakes, impressed by the past few hours. Scholz said on Friday that we must ensure that the war does not escalate into a war between Russia and NATO.
In this context, he underlined his rejection of the delivery of long-range cruise missiles and campaigned: “I say that only with the SPD can prudence and clear support for Ukraine come together on this difficult issue.”
Scholz called the recent Russian attack on Ukraine with a new intermediate-range missile a “terrible escalation, just like the use of North Korean soldiers who are now deployed in this war and dying for Putin’s imperial dream.”
Ukraine demands response from the international community
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called on the international community to respond decisively to the Russian attack. “This is a clear and serious expansion of the scale and brutality of this war, a cynical violation of the UN Charter by Russia,” Zelensky wrote on social networks.
Putin “doesn’t care what China, Brazil, European countries, America and all other countries in the world demand.”
In recent days, Ukraine has reportedly fired American-made ATACMS missiles and British Storm Shadow cruise missiles at military targets in Russia. Zelenskyj explained that this falls under international law as a defense against Russia’s war of aggression. “Our right to self-defense is the same as that of any other country.”
Source: Krone
I am Ida Scott, a journalist and content author with a passion for uncovering the truth. I have been writing professionally for Today Times Live since 2020 and specialize in political news. My career began when I was just 17; I had already developed a knack for research and an eye for detail which made me stand out from my peers.
