Vladimir Putin’s government is set to rip up a key treaty in a move sure to escalate nuclear tensions with the West.
The Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organisation verifies that nuclear-armed nations are adhering to a ban on testing weapons of mass destruction.
It has been ratified by Russia but as of yesterday lawmakers in Moscow were given 10 days to find the best way to revoke the treaty.
In a move that sent tensions soaring, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov claimed earlier that the United States was planning to test nuclear weapons in the Nevada desert.
He previously said that Russia would only begin testing its nuclear weapons if the US did the same. Vladimir Putin has also discussed restarting nuclear tests which may have led to the move.
Ryabkov added that Russia’s foreign ministry was drafting a bill which would revoke the treaty.
The news comes amid increasingly hostile nuclear rhetoric from Russian propagandists and politicians as Moscow’s forces bog down in Ukraine.
Last month, former Russian President and close Putin ally Dmitri Medvedev threatened direct conflict with NATO which he predicted would end in nuclear war.
He said: “We are ready, although the result will be achieved at [a] much greater cost to humanity than in 1945.”
In 1945, the US dropped two atomic bombs on Imperial Japan before they surrendered ending the Second World War.
The nuclear rhetoric comes at a time when Ukraine is targeting Russia close to home with regular drone strikes inside Russian territory as well as operations in occupied Crimea.
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