Secretary of State of USA Antony Blinken has ruled out the establishment of a no-fly zone in Ukrain, however, promising support for Ukrainians.
He also said the war in Ukraine will probably become even more punishing for civilians, as Russia employs brutal tactics it has used to deadly effect in other conflicts.
Blinken spoke following talks with foreign ministers from the European Union, NATO and the G-7 bloc on the first day of a European tour aimed at illustrating Western unity in opposition to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine where the conflict enters its second week.
Both Blinken and Stoltenberg said enforcement would require sending NATO aircraft into Ukrainian airspace to shoot down Russian jets — something the alliance is unwilling to do.
“That could lead to a full fledged war in Europe,” Blinken said. “President Biden has been clear that we are not going to get into a war with Russia.”
Zelensky on Friday criticized NATO’s decision in a speech published by the presidency.
Throughout his rapid-fire meetings, Blinken praised nations in Europe and beyond for the unprecedented avalanche of sanctions and economic penalties unleashed on Russia in recent days.
Without a united Western front, Blinken and his counterparts repeated, Russia’s action could not only yield a sustained human catastrophe, but shake the foundations of European security established over decades.
Speaking during a break in his talks, Blinken recounted that Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba, who joined one of the discussions by video link, had shown the group a photograph of a man in Ukraine grieving over his dead child, whose corpse was covered in a blood-spattered sheet.
“We understand the desperation,” Stoltenberg said earlier in the day when asked about a potential no-fly zone. “But we also believe that if we did that, we would end up with something that could lead to a full-fledged war in Europe, involving much more countries and much more suffering.”
To impose a no-fly zone in Ukraine would require Biden and other leaders to “level with their own people, and to be aware that this might put us at war with Russia,” he continued.
After their meeting, the ministers from the G-7 bloc — which includes the United States, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Britain and Japan — criticized Russia’s shelling of a nuclear power plant in Ukraine.
“Any armed attack on and threat against nuclear facilities devoted to peaceful purposes constitutes a violation of the principles of international law,” they said.