West Warns Putin Could Use Chemical Weapons To Revive Struggling War Effort

Russian President Vladimir Putin could use chemical weapons in Ukraine, warned Western officials.

According to Daily Mail, the officials' assessment was that an "utterly horrific" attack on Ukraine’s capital Kyiv could come in an attempt to revive the Russian war effort. The effort has stalled in recent days amid mechanical failures, a lack of fuel for their armored vehicles and logistical issues.

This comes as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that a Russian missile attack had landed a "direct strike" on one of Mariupol's maternity hospitals that was decimated. Women and children are feared being trapped underground in the attack that foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba called a "petrifying war crime."

A Western official said that they have got a "good reason to be concerned about possible use of non-conventional weapons, partly because of what we've seen has happened in other theatres." Sharing an example, the official said that what "we've seen in Syria, partly because we've seen a bit of setting the scene for that in the false flag claims that are coming out, and other indications as well." The official said that it's a "serious concern for us."

The UK has handed Kyiv 3,615 anti-tank weapons, known as NLAWs, said Defense Secretary Ben Wallace. According to Downing Street, Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who met his Polish counterpart Mateusz Morawiecki Tuesday, believed it "wouldn't be tenable for North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) pilots and NATO-badged jets to be shooting down Russian aircraft." Such a move would risk provoking a wider conflict, fear allies.

The Western official said that the difference between the weapons is that the existing support is "defensive." The official said that you "can't use a NLAW to attack Moscow, you can't use the Stingers to launch over a long range." The official shared that some NATO members would have seen Polish aircraft as "very different and possibly likely to provoke a different kind of Russian reaction." According to the official, Russian troops on the ground are "continuing to tighten the noose" around Kyiv.

Another official warned of more repression of the people in Russia to come as Putin faces a campaign that he didn't prepare his troops or citizens for. The official said that this will end because of a "combination of factors, one of them is the impact of sanctions." The official added that Russians are starting to notice Western measures such as restrictions on paying with Apple Pay and credit cards.

According to the official, currently it's "more inconvenience rather than hardship and it's a shock for Russians who didn't expect the invasion and are suddenly seeing the sorts of things that they've got used to that are normal in most European countries are suddenly being taken away."

Meanwhile, Ukraine has called on Russia to "capitulate" as Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov prepares for "peace talks" with Kyiv’s foreign minister in Turkey Thursday, reported Daily Mail. Lavrov arrived in Antalya to negotiate with Kuleba at a summit mediated by Ankara, which has supplied Ukraine with drones. Ankara condemned the invasion, but criticized punitive global sanctions against Russia.

The meeting will be the highest-level diplomatic encounter since Russia launched a full-scale operation to "demilitarize" and "de-Nazify" Ukraine. But Kuleba said that his expectations were "limited."