EU summons Russian Chargé d'Affaires, stating Russian threats "smell like desperation"
Kyiv • UNN
The European Union has summoned a Russian diplomat over threats of new strikes on Kyiv. The European Commission called Russia's actions a sign of desperation and promised continued support.
The EU has summoned Russia's top diplomat in Brussels following Russia's threats of new strikes on Kyiv, European Commission spokesperson Anita Hipper said during a briefing, noting that the EU maintains its presence and activities in Kyiv and that these Russian threats "smell like desperation," UNN reports.
What we have seen is that Russia is only trying to sow panic, issuing these threats. They want fear and isolation in Ukraine and elsewhere, but we have a clear message this will not work. The EU is maintaining its presence and operation in Kiev, and these threats smell like desperation, as the High Representative also pointed out in her tweet
"Russia is losing in the battlefield, so now it resorts once again to threatening civilians and civilian infrastructure," the European Commission spokesperson continued. "These attacks are unfortunately a daily reality for Ukraine, for Kiev, and its citizens, and in fact also our delegation on the ground and the civilian mission has been hit in reckless attacks."
"We recall once more that any international Intentional attacks against civilians and non-military objectives are war crimes. All commanders, perpetrators, and accomplices of these grave violations of international humanitarian law will be held to account," Hipper emphasized.
We have just now summoned the Russian charge d'affaires. This has just happened, and conveying our messages that this is clearly not acceptable
She pointed out that "this once more actually one thing that we already knew that Russia is absolutely not interested in any peace and has a total disregard for all the efforts towards the peace efforts."
"What we will do on our side, is to continue our support to Ukraine that needs air defence and further financial support and also in the upcoming days we will have the EU foreign ministers at the informal in Cyprus and we will there once more discuss with the High Representative the increase of international pressure on Russia," Hipper noted.
"As if it was not enough to strike civilians with nuclear capable ballistic missiles as we have seen during the weekend, as if it was not enough. Now these threats," added European Commission spokesperson Paula Pinho.