KYIV: Ukraine said on Sunday it was seeking an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council to counter Russia’s “nuclear blackmail” after President Vladimir Putin announced that his country would station tactical nuclear arms in Belarus.

The Russian leader said the deployment was similar to moves by the United States, which stores such weapons in bases across Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Turkey — an analogy Western allies called “misleading.”

The European Union’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said on Sunday Brussels was ready to impose new sanctions on Belarus if it were to host such weapons.

“Belarus hosting Russian nuclear weapons would mean an irresponsible escalation and threat to European security. Belarus can still stop it; it is their choice. The EU stands ready to respond with further sanctions,” he tweeted.

With fears of a nuclear war rising since the Feb. 24, 2022 invasion, experts believe that any Russian strike is likely to involve small-size battlefield weapons, called “tactical,” as opposed to “strategic” high-powered long-range nuclear weapons.

“Ukraine expects effective actions to counteract the Kremlin’s nuclear blackmail from the United Kingdom, China, the United States and France,” Kyiv’s Foreign Ministry said. “We demand that an extraordinary meeting of the UN Security Council be immediately convened for this purpose.”

Last Saturday, Putin announced that Russia would station tactical nuclear weapons in its neighbor and ally Belarus “without violating our international agreements on nuclear nonproliferation.”

The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry accused Russia of breaching its obligations, and of undermining the “nuclear disarmament architecture and the international security system in general.”

It called on “all members of the international community to convey to the criminal Putin regime the categorical unacceptability of its latest nuclear provocations.”

In the interview broadcast on Saturday, Putin said deploying tactical nuclear weapons to Belarus was “nothing unusual.”

“The United States has been doing this for decades. They have long placed their tactical nuclear weapons on the territory of their allies,” he said, adding that he spoke to Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko and said, “we agreed to do the same.”

Russia will start training crews on April 3 and plans to finish the construction of a special storage facility for tactical nuclear weapons by July 1.

Germany and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) said the analogy was deceptive.

“The comparison made by President Putin to nuclear sharing in NATO is misleading and does not justify the step announced by Russia,” an official in the German foreign office told Agence France-Presse (AFP).

NATO also joined the criticism, with spokesman Oana Lungescu saying “Russia’s reference to NATO’s nuclear sharing is totally misleading. NATO allies act with full respect of their international commitments.”

She also blasted Russia’s announcement as “dangerous and irresponsible.”

The US and NATO said separately they did not see grounds to change their nuclear posture.

“We have not seen any reason to adjust our own strategic nuclear posture nor any indications Russia is preparing to use a nuclear weapon,” the US Defense Department said in a statement.

‘Rising’ tensions

Putin has previously said nuclear tensions were “rising” globally, but that Moscow would not deploy first.

Back in February 2022, Minsk allowed the Kremlin to launch its invasion of Ukraine from Belarusian territory.

Fears have since risen that Belarus may join its ally’s offensive, but Lukashenko said he would do so “only if attacked.”

On Sunday, Oleksiy Danilov, secretary of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council, wrote on Twitter that “the Kremlin took Belarus as a nuclear hostage.”

The move is “a step toward the internal destabilization of the country,” he added.

The Russian leader said renewed discussions with Lukashenko on the issue were spurred by a UK official’s suggestion to send depleted uranium weapons to Ukraine.

Moscow has “what it needs to answer” if the West supplied Ukraine with such ammunition, he added.

“Without exaggeration, we have hundreds of thousands of such shells. We have not used them yet,” Putin said.