The US embassy in Kyiv, Ukraine has received information of a potential significant air attack on Wednesday and will be closed, the US department of state consular affairs said in a statement.
“Out of an abundance of caution, the embassy will be closed, and embassy employees are being instructed to shelter in place,” the department said in a statement published on the website of the US embassy in Kyiv.
“The US embassy recommends US citizens be prepared to immediately shelter in the event an air alert is announced.”
The decision comes after it was revealed that the US will provide Ukraine with anti-personnel landmines to blunt the advance of Russian troops, an official said, in the latest effort by the Biden administration to bolster support for Kyiv ahead of president-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration.
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The mines the US will send to Ukraine are “non-persistent,” becoming inert after a preset period that can last from a few hours to two weeks, according to the source.
The decision, reported earlier by the Washington Post, came about after president Joe Biden dropped his long-standing opposition to long-range strikes on Russia with the American-made Army Tactical Missile Systems, known as ATACMS. Washington’s shift on missile strikes came about after North Korean troops arrived to support Russian forces on the battlefield.
Ukraine took advantage of the ATACMS approval to strike a military base on Russian territory. Moscow, which has warned against such actions, stepped up its threat of a nuclear response to conventional attacks.
The Biden administration has vowed to expedite weapons deliveries and other support for Ukraine ahead of Mr Trump’s inauguration on January 20th. The president-elect has repeatedly criticised Mr Biden’s approach to the war and promised to end the conflict even before taking office.
Elsewhere, Greenpeace has warned Ukraine’s power network is at “heightened risk of catastrophic failure” after Russia’s missile and drone attack on Sunday, raising fears about the safety of the country’s three operational nuclear power stations.
The strikes by Moscow were aimed at electricity substations “critical to the operation of Ukraine’s nuclear plants” and there is a possibility that the reactors could lose power and become unsafe, according to a briefing note prepared for the Guardian.
Shaun Burnie, nuclear expert at Greenpeace Ukraine, said: “It is clear that Russia is using the threat of a nuclear disaster as a major military lever to defeat Ukraine. But by undertaking the attacks Russia is risking a nuclear catastrophe in Europe, which is comparable to Fukushima in 2011, Chernobyl in 1986 or even worse.”
The pressure group called on Russia to immediately halt its attacks on Ukraine’s energy grid and for the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to deploy permanent monitors in substations critical to the country’s nuclear plants. The IAEA conducted one inspection in late October, but has not committed to return.
Though Greenpeace is an independent organisation, it maintains contact with Ukraine’s government. Official Ukrainian sources acknowledged Greenpeace’s technical analysis of the crisis.
In 1986, Ukraine was the location of the world’s worst nuclear disaster, when a faulty design led to an explosion and destruction of a reactor at Chernobyl. Thirty people died within a month, and radioactive material spread into Ukraine, Belarus and Russia and to a lesser extent into Scandinavia and Europe.
A special hotline in place to deflate crises between the Kremlin and the White House is not currently being used, the Kremlin said on Wednesday, as nuclear risks rise amid the highest tensions between Russia and West in decades.
Russian president Vladimir Putin on Tuesday lowered the threshold for a nuclear strike in response to a broader range of conventional attacks, days after reports said Washington had allowed Ukraine to use US-made weapons to strike deep into Russia.
Ukraine used US ATACMS missiles to strike Russian territory on Tuesday, taking advantage of the newly granted permission from the outgoing Biden administration on the war’s 1,000th day.
A so-called hotline between Moscow and Washington was established in 1963 to reduce the misperceptions that stoked the Cuban missile crisis of 1962 by allowing direct communication between US and Russian leaders. – Agencies