Igor Ivanov, foreign minister from
1998 to 2004 under Boris Yeltsin and current President Vladimir Putin,
said the risk of a nuclear war in Europe is higher than at any time in
the 1980s.Mr Ivanov, now the head of a Russian Government think-tank,
said: “The risk of confrontation with the use of nuclear weapons in Europe is higher than in the 1980s.”
Both Russia and the United States have
fewer nuclear weapons than in the Cold War period but with just over
7,000 nuclear warheads each, they still have about 90 per cent of world
stocks, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research
Institute.Talking at a Brussels event with the foreign ministers of
Ukraine and Poland, and a US lawmaker, the ex-politician, said: “We have less nuclear warheads, but the risk of them being used is growing.”
Russia has been warned about intimidating its neighbours with talk
about nuclear weapons by NATO’s secretary general Jens Stoltenberg,
voicing concerns among Western officials.
But Mr Ivanov blamed a missile defence shield being set up by the United States in Europe for raising the stakes.
Part of the shield is a site in
Poland due to become operational in 2018 which is particularly
sensitive for the Kremlin because it brings US capabilities close to
Russian borders.
The US and NATO say the shield is designed to protect Europe against
Iranian ballistic missiles and is neither targeted at Russia nor capable
of downing its missiles.
Referring to Russia’s Baltics territory, Mr Ivanov added: “It
can be assured that once the US deploys its missile defence system in
Poland, Russia would respond by deploying its own missile defence system
in Kaliningrad.”Mr Ivanov showed further aggressive rhetoric over
the situation in Ukraine, saying Europe and Russia have little chance of
a broader reconciliation, despite European and NATO diplomats seeking a
political solution to the separatist conflict in Ukraine which has
slaughtered more than 9,000 people since April 2014.He said: “The paths
of Europe and Russia are seriously diverging and will remain so for a
long time, probably for decades to come.” Russia could not be the eastern flank of a “failed greater Europe”, he insisted.
