President Putin Says Russia Can Solve War In Ukraine Without Nuclear Weapons

President Putin when receiving Trufanov's family in the Kremlin. (Source: TASS/Sofya Sandurskaya)

JAKARTA - Russia has sufficient capability to successfully complete special military operations in Ukraine without using nuclear weapons, President Vladimir Putin said in a conversation with journalist Pavel Zarubin.

It was conveyed in a state television documentary about a quarter century President Putin being Russia's supreme leader entitled "Russia, Kremlin, Putin, 25 years", when asked about the risk of nuclear escalation from the Ukraine war.

"They want to provoke us, want us to make mistakes," he said, launching TASS May 5.

"And there is no need to use the (nuclear) weapon you mentioned. I hope that's not necessary," he added.

"We have sufficient capabilities and means to complete what we start in 2022 with the results Russia needs," President Putin said.

Previously, Russia had repeatedly emphasized its stance that the use of nuclear weapons would be its last resort. In November, President Putin had approved an updated Russian nuclear doctrine.

The President of Putin ordered thousands of Russian troops to Ukraine in February 2022, which sparked the largest land conflict in Europe since the Second World War and the biggest confrontation between Moscow and the West since the Cold War.

Hundreds of thousands of soldiers have been killed or injured on both sides since the war broke out.

Putin, the former lieutenant KGB colonel who was appointed president on the last day of 1999 by Boris Yeltsin who was sick, was the Kremlin leader who served the longest since Josef Stalin, who ruled for 29 years until his death in 1953.

Russian dissidents see Putin as a dictator who has built a fragile private government system that relies on corruption and corruption that has led Russia to setbacks and chaos.

On the other hand, supporters consider Putin, who Russian polls say has an approval rating of above 85 percent, as a savior against the arrogant West and ending the chaos that led to the 1991 Soviet Union's disintegration.