Biden says Putin's nuclear threat brings risk of ‘Armageddon’

NEW YORK/KYIV, Oct 07 (Reuters/AFP): Russian President Vladimir Putin's threat to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine has brought the world closer to "Armageddon" than at any time since the Cold-War Cuban Missile Crisis, US President Joe Biden said.
Putin celebrated his 70th birthday to fawning praise from some officials. But with his seven-month invasion unravelling, public events appeared sparse, a contrast to just a week ago, when he staged a huge concert on Red Square to proclaim the annexation of nearly a fifth of Ukrainian land.
In a clear repudiation of Putin's record, the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Russia's most prominent human rights group, Memorial, which Moscow shut down over the past year. A Ukrainian human rights group and a jailed campaigner against abuses by the pro-Russian government in Belarus were also awarded.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Kyiv's forces were swiftly recapturing more territory, including more than 500 sq km in the south where they burst through a second major front this week.
Russia's failings on the battlefield have brought unusual public recrimination from Kremlin allies, with one Russian-installed leader in occupied Ukrainian territory going so far as to suggest Putin's defence minister should have shot himself.
Biden said the prospect of defeat could make Putin desperate enough to use nuclear weapons, the biggest risk since US President John Kennedy and Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev faced off over missiles in Cuba in 1962.
"We have not faced the prospect of Armageddon since Kennedy and the Cuban missile crisis," Biden said in New York. "For the first time since the Cuban Missile Crisis, we have a direct threat to the use of nuclear weapons, if in fact things continue down the path they'd been going."
Putin was "not joking when he talks about potential use of tactical nuclear weapons or biological or chemical weapons, because his military is, you might say, is significantly underperforming," Biden said.
An AFP report adds: Ukraine's Defence Minister Oleksiy Reznikov on Friday called on Russian troops to lay down their arms, promising them "life and safety."
"You can still save Russia from tragedy and the Russian army from humiliation," Reznikov said in Russian in a video addressed to Russian troops.
"We guarantee life, safety and justice for all who refuse to fight immediately. And we will ensure a tribunal for those who gave criminal orders," he promised.
"You have been deceived and betrayed" by the Kremlin, Reznikov said.
"It's easier for them to tell you that you died heroically in battle against imaginary NATO hordes. It is true that NATO countries are supplying us with weapons. But it is Ukrainian soldiers who are beating you with these weapons," Reznikov said.
Reznikov said that "Ukrainian soldiers do not need Russian lands, we have enough of our own. And we are taking them all back."
Ukrainian troops have been leading counter-offensives in the south and the east of the country in the past few weeks, clawing back large swathes of territory.
Meanwhile, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan spoke by phone with Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin about improving bilateral ties and he repeated Ankara's willingness to do its part to peacefully resolve the war in Ukraine, Erdogan's office said on Friday.
The latest developments in Ukraine, which Russia invaded earlier this year, were also discussed in the call, according to Turkey's Directorate of Communications.
NATO member Turkey has close relations with both Ukraine and Russia and has sought to balance ties during the war, rejecting Western sanctions on Moscow while criticising the Russian invasion and supplying Kyiv with armed drones.
Along with the United Nations, Turkey brokered the July deal to unlock Ukrainian grain exports from its Black Sea ports, in what remains the only significant diplomatic breakthrough in the seven-month-old conflict.