Former president also warns Moscow will use ‘absolutely any weapon’ if Kyiv attempts to retake Crimea
The Russian former president Dmitry Medvedev said Moscow was preparing for a Ukrainian counteroffensive, as Kyiv claimed Russian forces were “running out of steam”.
“They [the Ukrainian side] are preparing for an offensive, everyone knows that. Our general staff is calculating this and is preparing its own solutions,” Medvedev said in an interview with Russian media on Friday.
Medvedev, who is deputy chair of Putin’s powerful security council, further warned that Moscow was ready to use “absolutely any weapon” if Ukraine attempted to retake the Crimean peninsula that Russia annexed in 2014.
Medvedev’s latest apparent threat to use nuclear weapons came amid growing acknowledgment in Moscow that its forces may soon find themselves on the defensive in Ukraine as its own winter offensive appears to be slowing down.
In a video interview released on his social media channels Thursday, Yevgeny Prigozhin, the Wagner group’s head, warned that Ukraine was planning to surround the private military’s forces in Bakhmut and push forward toward the Black Sea in the partially occupied Zaporizhzhia region.
