Live Blog | Putin Threatened Johnson With Rocket Attack Related Articles

Boris Johnson: Putin threatened to fire a missile at me

01:40 | In a phone call shortly before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Vladimir Putin threatened to fire a missile at Boris Johnson. The former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom says so in a documentary that will air on Monday on the BBC.

“At one point he threatened me a little bit and said, ‘Boris, I don’t want to hurt you, but if I deploy a missile, it’ll be done in the blink of an eye. Or something like that,'” Johnson said on the show. , which talks about the growing tensions between the Russian leader and the West in the years before the invasion of Ukraine. Johnson says he concluded from Putin’s relaxed tone at the time that the Russian president was simply responding to his attempts to negotiate.

The former prime minister says in the documentary that in the conversation he tried to convince Putin that there were no immediate plans to admit Ukraine to NATO, and that he warned the Russian president that an invasion would lead to “more NATO, not less BORN”. on the Russian border.

Sunday 29 January

Zelenskyj: To welcome the Russians to the Games is to accept terror

21:15 | In his usual video message on Sunday, Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelensky strongly condemned the plan to allow Russian athletes to participate in the 2024 Olympic tournament in France under a neutral flag. The IOC’s attempts to get the Russians to take action at the Olympics are trying to tell the whole world that terror is somehow acceptable.

The Ukrainian leader added that Russia absolutely should not be allowed to “use the Games or any other sporting event to promote its aggression or national chauvinism”.

Zelensky again urged the speeding up of deliveries of heavier weapons and equipment to support the fight against the invading Moscow army. He called the situation in the eastern Donetsk region very difficult. Bachmoet, Voehledar, but also other places are constantly under fire. “Russia wants to prolong the war and deplete our troops. So we have to make time our weapon. Speed ​​things up, speed up supplies and open up new weapons options for Ukraine.”

Erdogan would like to admit Finland to NATO

20:20 | Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan hinted on TV on Sunday that he would approve Finland’s NATO membership, without doing the same for Sweden. ‘If necessary, we will send a different message to Finland. If we do that, it will be a shock for Sweden,” the Turkish leader replied to a question from a young voter about both countries’ candidacy.

Erdogan is not yet in favor of Sweden joining the alliance. He wants Scandinavians to first extradite Kurds living there whom Ankara considers terrorists or involved in the failed 2016 coup attempt. The burning of a Koran by a far-right Swedish-Danish politician outside the Turkish embassy in Stockholm strengthened his position.

Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson said last week that he wanted to resume talks with Turkey as soon as possible. The Finns would prefer to join NATO together with the neighboring country, but if that takes too long, they are considering joining on their own. Apart from Turkey, Hungary has not yet taken a decision on the accession of Sweden and Finland. Parliament should do it in February.