Officials in Kyiv and several Western countries rejected claims made without evidence by the Kremlin that Ukraine is planning to use a “dirty bomb” — an explosive weapon designed to scatter radioactive material — on its own territory, characterizing them as an attempt by Russia to create a pretext for escalating the conflict.
“We all reject Russia’s transparently false allegations that Ukraine is preparing to use a dirty bomb on its own territory,” foreign ministers from the United States, France and the United Kingdom said in a Sunday joint statement, after Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu made the unfounded claim in conversations with the countries’ defense ministers.
“The world would see through any attempt to use this allegation as a pretext for escalation,” the Western diplomats added.
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According to summaries of Shoigu’s calls posted by the Russian Ministry of Defense, he told defense officials Sunday that he was concerned about “possible provocations by Ukraine with the use of a ‘dirty bomb,’ ” and noted that the situation in Ukraine is “rapidly deteriorating.”
Ukrainian officials immediately rejected Shoigu’s claims and accused Russia of making false threats to justify its own escalatory attack on Ukrainian territory. Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine’s foreign minister, said he extended a formal invitation to U.N. nuclear inspectors to independently establish that Ukraine has “nothing to hide.”
The Washington Post could not verify either side’s claim. The...
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