Ukraine's president Volodymyr Zelensky has in a video address refuted Russian claims that chemical weapons or weapons of mass destruction were developed in Ukraine. He also warned that Russia would get "the most severe sanctions response" if it were to use such weapons against Ukraine.
“That worries me very much because we have often been convinced that if you want to know Russia’s plans, they are what Russia accuses others of,” he said in his nightly address to the nation.
Russia said it uncovered plans to create secret laboratories in Ukraine to produce biological weapons.
“I am a reasonable person. The president of a reasonable country and reasonable people. I am the father of two children,” he said. “And no chemical or any other weapon of mass destruction has been developed on my land. The whole world knows this.”
The US has called such claims "laughable", and says they are a "false flag" to justify Russia's potential use of similar weapons against Ukraine.
The U.N. Security Council will meet on Friday to discuss what Russia claims are “the military biological activities of the U.S. on the territory of Ukraine.”
Council diplomats confirmed the meeting scheduled for 10 a.m. EST, speaking on condition of anonymity ahead of an official announcement.
Russia requested the meeting in a tweet Thursday afternoon from its first deputy U.N. ambassador, Dmitry Polyansky.
The request came after the Biden administration rejected the accusation, made without evidence by Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, that Ukraine was running chemical and biological labs with U.S. support.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki Psaki called Russia’s claim “preposterous.” On Wednesday, warned that Russia might seek to use chemical or biological weapons against Ukraine, the neighbor it has invaded.
“This is all an obvious ploy by Russia to try to justify its further premeditated, unprovoked, and unjustified attack on Ukraine,” Psaki tweeted.
But Dmitry Chumakov, another Russian deputy U.N. ambassador, repeated the accusation Wednesday, urging Western media to cover “the news about secret biological laboratories in Ukraine.”
