Ukraine live briefing: Blinken warns China against giving ‘lethal support’ to Russia, as leaders meet in Munich
Wang said at the Munich conference that world leaders need to think “about what kind of efforts we can make to stop this war.” Chinese President Xi Jinping is set to deliver a “peace speech” Friday, the anniversary of Russia’s invasion.
Here’s the latest on the war and its ripple effects across the globe.
Key developments
- Blinken said “we’ve made very clear” to China that providing legal support to Russia for its war “would cause a serious problem for us and in our relationship,” according to an advance transcript of his interview with CBS’s Margaret Brennan. Washington’s concern “is based on information” that indicates Chinese companies are considering boosting their aid to Russia from non-lethal to lethal, he said.
- Blinken is in Turkey on an official visit. He will attempt Sunday to convince Ankara to support Finland and Sweden’s bids to join NATO, Reuters reported. Adding countries to the military alliance requires unanimity among its members, and Turkey is the main holdout.
- Russia’s ambassador to Washington responded after Vice President Harris accused Russia of committing “crimes against humanity” in Ukraine in a speech at the Munich conference. Anatoly Antonov accused the Biden administration of attempting to “demonize” Russia, and claimed Washington was trying to “justify its own actions to foment the Ukrainian crisis,” according to a transcript published Sunday by Tass, a Russian state-owned news organization.
- The European Union’s foreign policy chief expressed support for an Estonian proposal to jointly procure munitions to help arm Ukraine. Josep Borrell said in Munich that he “completely” agrees with the proposal, outlined by Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, for E.U. member states to pool resources to buy artillery shells for Ukraine. “We are working on that and it will work,” Borrell said.
- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said world leaders sent “strong signals” at the conference about holding Russia accountable for its actions in Ukraine. In his nightly address, he also expressed optimism about world leaders’ ongoing commitment to supporting Kyiv in its fight.
Battleground updates
- Russian forces struck the region of Mykolaiv in southern Ukraine Sunday morning, according to Gov. Vitaliy Kim. Two settlements were hit with artillery around 6 a.m. local time, Kim said. According to preliminary information, no one was killed or injured in the strikes, though Kim said the extent of the damage was still being clarified.
- Balloons spotted by Ukraine’s Armed Forces over Kyiv and Dnipro in the past week were probably Russian, said Britain’s Defense Ministry. The balloons, which carried radar reflectors, “likely represent a new tactic by Russia to gain information about Ukrainian air defence systems and compel the Ukrainians to expend valuable stocks of surface to air missiles and ammunition,” the ministry said. One such balloon may have drifted from Ukraine into Moldovan airspace, the ministry said, leading that country to temporarily close its airspace on Feb. 14.
- The United States has spoken with Elon Musk’s SpaceX about the use of its Starlink satellite technology in Ukraine, Blinken told CBS’s Chuck Todd in an interview that aired Sunday. A SpaceX executive accused the Ukrainian military this month of using Starlink for to power drones and said the company had taken steps to prevent unauthorized uses of its communication technology. When asked whether the U.S. government had spoken with Musk and Starlink about the restriction, Blinken said, “Well, I can’t share any conversations we’ve had other than to say we’ve had conversations.”
Global impact
- French President Emmanuel Macron said that “crushing Russia” has never been his country’s objective. Macron said in an interview with local media, “I do not think, as some people do, that we must defeat Russia completely, attack Russia on its own soil.” Macron has long called for a diplomatic solution to the conflict, and was criticized in Kyiv when he previously called on the West not to “humiliate” Russia.
- The West is showing Russian President Vladimir Putin that Ukraine’s allies will not “lose our nerve,” British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak told the security conference. In his speech, Sunak urged allies to send more support, and he mentioned his nation’s vow to send longer-range missiles and other military aid.
- The Dutch government is limiting the number of Russian diplomats allowed in the Netherlands and closing the Russian trade office in Amsterdam, citing “Russia’s continued attempts to place intelligence officers into the Netherlands under diplomatic cover.”
From our correspondents
Putin, czar with no empire, needs military victory for his own survival: MOSCOW — President Vladimir Putin likes to portray himself as a new czar like Peter the Great or Ivan III, the 15th-century grand prince known as the “gatherer of the Russian lands.” But Putin’s nearly year-long war in Ukraine has failed so far to secure the lands he aims to seize, and, in Russia, there is fear that he is leading his nation into a dark period of strife and stagnation or worse.
Some in the elite also say the Russian leader now desperately needs a military victory to ensure his own survival, Robyn Dixon and Catherine Belton report. “In Russia, loyalty does not exist,” said one Russian billionaire.
Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began with hubris and a zeal to reshape the world order. But even as he suffered repeated military defeats — diminishing his stature globally and staining him with allegations of atrocities being committed by his troops — Putin has tightened his authoritarian grip at home, using the war to destroy any opposition and to engineer a closed, paranoid society hostile to liberals, hipsters, LGBTQ people, and, especially, to Western-style freedom and democracy.
Now, with his troops reinforced by conscripts and convicts and poised to launch new offensives, the 70-year-old Russian leader needs a win to maintain his own credibility. “Putin needs some success to demonstrate to society that he is still very successful,” a senior Ukrainian security official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss politically sensitive issues.
Rick Noack, Emily Rauhala and Adela Suliman contributed to this report.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment