JAKARTA - The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) on Sunday criticized Russia's "dangerous and irresponsible" nuclear rhetoric by Russian President Vladimir Putin, the day after he said he would place a tactical nuclear weapon in Belarus.
President Putin announced the move on Saturday, likening it to the United States that placed its weapons in Europe, insisting that Russia would not violate its nuclear non-proliferation promises.
Although this move is unexpected, it is one of Russia's most prominent nuclear signals since the start of the invasion of Ukraine 13 months ago. Ukraine on Sunday called for a meeting of the UN Security Council to respond.
Meanwhile, Washington, another nuclear superpower in the world, has underestimated concerns about President Putin's announcement, NATO said that the Russian President's non-proliferation pledge and his explanation of the US arms deployment abroad went a long way.
"Russia's reference to NATO's nuclear division is completely misleading. NATO allies acted with respect for their international commitment," a NATO spokesman said in an emailed comment to Reuters on Sunday.
"Russia has consistently violated its arms control commitment, the latest of which is to suspend its participation in the New START Agreement," continued the unnamed spokesman.
New START limits the number of strategic nuclear warheads that the United States and Russia can deploy, as well as the deployment of ground-based missiles, submarines and bombers to deliver.
Ukraine's main security adviser Volodymyr Zelensky, Oleksify Danilov, said the Russian plan would also destabilize Belarus, which Moscow said had been held hostage.
Experts say Russia's move is very important because until now Russia is proud that unlike the United States, Russia has not deployed nuclear weapons beyond its borders. This may be the first time since the mid-1990s Russia has done so.
Another senior adviser to President Zelensky on Sunday ridiculed President Putin's plans, saying the Russian leader was "too predictable".
"Making a statement about a tactical nuclear weapon in Belarus, he admits that he is afraid of losing & all he can do is scare with tactics," Mykhailo Podolyak wrote on Twitter.
Separately, Washington said it saw no change in Moscow's potential to use nuclear weapons in the war in Ukraine. Washington and NATO said the news would not affect their nuclear position.
"We haven't seen any changes in Russia's nuclear posture that will make us adjust our nuclear posture," wrote a NATO spokesman.
It is known that tactical nuclear weapons refer to weapons used for specific purposes on the battlefield, not weapons that have the ability to destroy the city. It is unclear how many such weapons Russia has, considering this is an area still shrouded in Cold War secrecy.
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