Supply of US F-16 jets will make Ukraine nuclear-capable: Russia's Lavrov

Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has warned that US-built F-16 fighter jets can "deliver" nuclear weapons if they are sent to Ukraine by the West.

Moscow has already warned against sending the advanced American warplane to the ex-Soviet republic by the Western countries, arguing that the move raises the question of US-led NATO’s direct military involvement in the war between Russia and Ukraine.

This is while a number of US allies have already volunteered to host the F-16 training of Ukrainian pilots, including Poland, which is one of Ukraine's biggest supporters.

On Tuesday, Lavrov said that when the West is said to supply F-16 jets to Kiev, Moscow has to bear in mind that such warplanes are also capable of carrying nuclear weapons.

"We must keep in mind that one of the modifications of the F-16 has the capability to deliver nuclear weapons. If they do not understand this, then they are worthless as military strategists and planners," Russia's top diplomat noted, as quoted by TASS news agency.

Lavrov, who was speaking at a military base in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, added that the West first equipped Kiev with long-range weapons and tanks and now is preparing to send F-16 jets to Ukraine.

"Anything can be expected from the leaders of the US and other Western countries (which Washington has completely subjugated). They are already proving this when, following advanced long-range weapons and tanks, they are now seriously preparing F-16s," he stated. 

"Some people say two squadrons are set to be transferred, others say there will be eight. They are preparing to continue to escalate the war that was unleashed against us," he further said.

Lavrov described Russia as a "peaceful" nation, which only "wants to be left alone so that no one tries to drag us into any US-led globalist organizations and mechanisms."

West ‘playing with fire’ by supplying Kiev with F-16s: Lavrov

Russia

Earlier in May, Britain announced during a summit of European leaders in Reykjavik, Iceland, that it was working with the Netherlands to build a so-called international "jet coalition" to help Ukraine obtain F-16 fighter jets from its mostly Western allies.

Initially, US President Joe Biden had said his country would not provide Ukraine with the jets. Last month, however, he told leaders of the Group of Seven (G7) countries in Japan that Washington was prepared to help train the Ukrainian pilots of F-16 fighter jets.

Ukraine, which largely operates aged Soviet-era warplanes, has placed the US-made F-16 at the top of its wish list.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has long been pressing the West for single-engine multirole fighter jets, arguing that their appearance with Ukrainian pilots would be a sure signal from the world that Russia's military operation in his country would end in defeat.

The Western countries want Russia to be "part of that global majority that the Americans, the Anglo-Saxons together with their allies simply exploited, as they used to do in colonial times. To put it simply, they want to live at someone else's expense," Lavrov added in his remarks.

Since the onset of the war in February last year, the United States and its European allies have unleashed an array of unprecedented sanctions against Russia and poured numerous batches of advanced weapons into Ukraine to help its military fend off the Russian troops, despite repeated warnings by the Kremlin that such measures will only prolong the war.

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