Donald Trump’s boast he would be able to “settle the war” in Ukraine if re-elected US president in November has been met with silence by the Kremlin. The former leader of the US also repeated his claim Russia wouldn’t have invaded Ukraine had he been in the White House.
He was speaking in a televised presidential debate against US president Joe Biden, whose disastrous performance has prompted calls for him to stand aside as the Democrats’ presidential candidate.
The Republicans’ candidate told viewers of the clash on CNN: “As far as Russia and Ukraine [are concerned], if we had a real president, a president that knew – that was respected by Putin – he would have never have invaded Ukraine.”
Mr Biden hit back saying Putin would invade Poland and other countries after Ukraine if Mr Trump’s approach were taken, criticising his predecessor as US leader by adding: “He has no idea what the hell he’s talking about.”
Meanwhile, Putin this week called for production of intermediate-range missiles banned under a now-scrapped treaty with the US to resume.
The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces treaty (INF) banned ground-based nuclear and conventional missiles with a range of 310-3,410 miles.
It was viewed as an arms control landmark when Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and US President Ronald Reagan signed it in 1988.
The United States withdrew from the treaty in 2019, citing Russian violations.
Putin told Russia’s national security council: “We need to start production of these strike systems and then, based on the actual situation, make decisions about where — if necessary to ensure our safety — to place them.”
The dictator said Russia hadn’t produced such missiles since the treaty was scrapped, adding “it is known” the United States not only produces such missile systems, but has already taken them to Denmark and the Philippines.
Since withdrawing from the treaty, the US Army has moved forward with developing a conventional, ground-launched, mid-range missile capability called the Typhon, which would have been banned under the INF. The Typhon fires two Navy missiles, the Tomahawk Land Attack Missile and Standard Missile-6.
The US Army ran the system through tests during an exercise in the Philippines this spring.
Putin’s statement and Mr Trump’s sparring with Mr Biden over Ukraine come amid rising tensions between Russia and the West over the conflict and concern about possible nuclear attacks.
Officials said on Saturday (June 29) that Russian shelling of front-line villages in eastern Ukraine killed four people while rescuers in the city of Dnipro dug through rubble after a Russian attack ripped through a nine-story residential building, leaving one dead.
The attacks came as Russia continues to stretch Ukrainian forces in areas along a 600-mile front. Moscow has stepped up airstrikes in a bid to drain Ukraine’s resources, often targeting energy facilities and other vital infrastructure.
A Ukrainian drone strike killed at least five people in Russia’s Kursk region, local officials said on Saturday. Two children were among the victims of the attack in the village of Gorodishche on the Russian-Ukrainian border, Governor Alexey Smirnov wrote on social media.
In its morning statement, the Russian Defence Ministry said six Ukrainian drones had been shot down overnight over the country’s Tver, Bryansk and Belgorod regions, as well as over the annexed Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea. It did not give information on the reported strike in the Kursk region.