Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned several countries may be in Vladimir Putin’s sights and will be at risk of an attack should Kyiv stop its resistance.
During a press conference, Mr Zelensky named four European nations he believes could share the same fate as Ukraine.
In a video shared by advisor to the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Anton Gerashchenko, the president said: “Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Moldova may be next. And it is certain if we do not withstand.”
Mr Zelensky, who has started a tour of the Baltic states and was today in Lithuania to thank the country for its approved package of long-term military assistance to Ukraine worth some £172million, noted Russia has been firing threats at a few nations in recent months.
He said: “We have heard recently that they have started talking about Finland, they have started talking about the independence of Uzbekistan, and so on. He [Vladimir Putin] will not finish this until we collectively finish him.”
In mid-December, the Russian President ominously said there will be “problems” with Finland after it joined the Western military alliance, NATO, in 2023.
He said: “They [the West] took Finland and dragged it into NATO! Why, did we have any disputes with Finland? All disputes, including those of a territorial nature in the middle of the 20th century, have all been resolved long ago.
“There were no problems, but now there will be, because we will now create the Leningrad military district there and definitely concentrate military units there.”
Finland’s accession to NATO is expected to be followed by that of Sweden, another country prompted to leave its neutral stance in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Also in December, ultranationalist pro-Kremlin writer Zakhar Prilepin had publicly called for the territory of Uzbekistan to be incorporated into Russia’s, prompting the Uzbek Foreign Ministry to summon Russian Ambassador Oleg Malginov.
Russian Foreign Ministry’s spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said the writer had only expressed “his personal opinion, that has nothing to do with Russia’s official position”.
Throughout 2023, Russia hasn’t just targeted single countries with its threats, but also raised fears of a new global war. In October, the Kremlin claimed to have rehearsed its ability to deliver a “massive” nuclear strike.
Mr Zelensky’s warning came as Ukraine continues to fight Russian troops on the battlefield. On January 10, the country’s Army General Staff said its forces had repelled dozens of Russian attacks in the direction of Avdiivka, Mariinsky, Kupiansk and Kherson.
At the same time, Ukraine is warning its Western allies it is running out of military supplies, as both the EU and the US have yet not approved the delivery of billions worth of aid to the war-torn nation.
