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Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday condemned comments by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky suggesting that Kyiv would seek nuclear weapons if it could not join Nato as a “dangerous provocation”.
The Ukrainian leader made the comments at an EU summit on Thursday, in which he said “either Ukraine will have nuclear weapons, which will protect us, or we must have some kind of alliance”.
“This is a dangerous provocation,” Putin said at a meeting with journalists from the Brics group of emerging economies, warning: “Any step in this direction will be met with a corresponding reaction.”
“It is not difficult to create nuclear weapons in the modern world,” Putin added.
“I do not know whether Ukraine is capable of doing it now, it is not so easy for Ukraine of today, but in general there is no great difficulty here.”
Zelensky sought to clarify his words in a televised interview on Friday, saying he wanted “to be understood very correctly”.