Ukraine war: Putin thought his enemies would ‘roll over’ but he was wrong, Biden says
Vladimir Putin thought his enemies would “roll over” but instead he “met the iron will of America and nations everywhere who refused to accept a world governed by fear”, Joe Biden has said.
The US president gave a speech from the gardens of Warsaw’s Royal Castle in Poland a day after he made a highly-secretive and historic visit to Kyiv in Ukraine.
“I can report: Kyiv stands strong, Kyiv stands proud, it stands tall and, most important, it stands free,” Mr Biden said this evening.
He continued: “When Russia invaded it wasn’t just Ukraine being tested, the whole world faced a test for the ages… all democracies were being tested.
“The questions we faced were as simple as they were profound. Would we respond or would we look the other way?
“Would we be strong or would we be weak?”
Pic: AP
‘Democracy was too strong’
Mr Biden continued: “One year later we know the answer.
“We did respond, we would be strong, we would be united, and the world would not look the other way.”
The US president spoke hours after Mr Putin blamed the West for starting the war in Ukraine and claimed his country responded with force “in order to stop it” in a state of the nation address today.
Mr Biden said: “President Putin ordered his tanks to roll into Ukraine, he thought we would roll over. He was wrong.
“The Ukrainian people were too brave. America, Europe, a coalition of nations from the Atlantic to the Pacific, we were too unified.
“Democracy was too strong. Instead of the easy victory he perceived and predicted, Putin left with burnt out tanks and Russia’s forces in disarray.
“He thought he would get the Finlandization of NATO, instead he got the NATO-isation of Finland and Sweden.”
The term Finlandization has been used to refer to the decision of a country not to challenge a more powerful neighbour in foreign politics while maintaining national sovereignty.
“He thought NATO would fracture and divide. Instead, NATO was more united and more unified ever than ever before,” Mr Biden continued.
“He thought autocrats like himself were tough and leaders of democracy were soft, and then he met the iron will of America and nations everywhere who refused to accept a world governed by fear and force.”
Pic: AP
Mr Biden continued: “President Putin is confronted with something today that he didn’t think was possible a year ago.
“The democracies of the world have grown stronger not weaker, but the autocrats of the world have grown weaker not stronger.”
Putin accuses Ukraine and US of ‘playing a dirty game’
In his surprise trip to Ukraine on Monday, Mr Biden said Washington would provide Kyiv with a new military aid package worth $500m (£412m) as he was pictured walking in the city with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
It came before Mr Putin said in his address today that Ukraine was in talks with the West about weapon supplies before Russia invaded its neighbour on 24 February last year.
“I would like to emphasise when Russia tried to find a peaceful solution they were playing with the lives of people and they were playing a dirty game,” Mr Putin said.
He said Russia decided to “protect its people and history” by conducting a “special military operation step-by-step” – as he warned that Moscow will “continue to resolve the objectives that are before us”.
The Russian president has always referred to the invasion as a “special military operation” since it began last year.
“I would like to repeat, they started the war and we used force in order to stop it,” he said in the address.
Read more:
Biden’s secretive trip to Kyiv was disguised as a ‘golf tourney’ – here’s how it unfolded
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Putin’s state of the nation address
Mr Putin also announced that Russia was suspending its participation in a key nuclear treaty with the US which limits the two sides’ strategic nuclear arsenals.
The New START treaty with the US caps the number of strategic nuclear warheads that the US and Russia can deploy.
Mr Putin said Russia was not fully withdrawing from the treaty and said Moscow must stand ready to resume nuclear weapons tests if the US does so.
NATO is most ‘consequential alliance in history’
Meanwhile, earlier in his visit to Poland today, Mr Biden reaffirmed the United States’ dedication to European security as he met Polish President Andrzej Duda during a series of consultations with allies to prepare for an even more complicated stage of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“We have to have security in Europe,” he said at the presidential palace in Warsaw on Tuesday.
“It’s that basic, that simple, that consequential.”
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US president Biden arrives in Poland
Mr Biden described NATO as “maybe the most consequential alliance in history” and he said it is “stronger than it’s ever been” despite Mr Putin’s hopes it would fracture over the war in Ukraine.
Mr Duda praised Mr Biden’s trip to Kyiv as “spectacular”, saying it “boosted (the) morale of Ukraine’s defenders”.
In his speech in Kyiv on Monday, Mr Biden said Mr Putin had believed Ukraine was “weak and the West was divided” and “thought he could outlast us” but added – “he was dead wrong”.
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Biden condemns ‘barbaric’ invasion on visit to Kyiv
Mr Zelenskyy said he discussed long-range weapons with Mr Biden and described negotiations as “very fruitful”.
The US president had travelled to Kyiv on a 10-hour train ride from Poland after a journey from Washington DC that was shrouded in secrecy.
The only two journalists allowed on the trip were sworn to secrecy and had their phones taken off them.
An email telling the journalists when to arrive at the relevant air base was disguised as an invite to a golf “tourney”.
World
US blocks Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and 80 other officials from United Nations’ annual meeting in New York
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and 80 other officials have been blocked from attending September’s annual meeting of the United Nations General Assembly in New York.
US secretary of state Marco Rubio has revoked the US visas of delegates from the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), and denied others from applying for one.
It is the latest step by Donald Trump’s administration to target Palestinians with visa restrictions, and follows the suspension of a programme to allow injured children from Gaza to receive treatment in the US.
Mahmoud Abbas addressed the general assembly in 2024, but is barred from next month’s meeting. Pic: Reuters
“It is in our national security interests to hold the PLO and PA accountable for not complying with their commitments, and for undermining the prospects for peace,” a statement from the US State Department said.
It added that, to be considered partners for peace, both groups “must consistently repudiate terrorism, and end incitement to terrorism in education, as required by US law and as promised by the PLO”.
Offensive will cause ‘intolerable deaths’
Several US allies, including France, Malta, and Australia have announced plans to recognise Palestine as a state at September’s United Nations General Assembly. Canada and the UK will too, unless Israel meets certain conditions.
Israel declared Gaza’s largest city a dangerous combat zone on Friday.
The army launched a planned offensive that has drawn international condemnation.
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Thick smoke rises from Gaza City after Israeli strikes
Foreign ministers from Iceland, Ireland, Luxembourg, Norway, Slovenia and Spain released a joint statement saying the military operations in Gaza City will cause “intolerable deaths of innocent Palestinian civilians”.
Gaza latest: Israel’s Gaza City offensive condemned
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are sheltering in Gaza City while enduring famine.
An Israeli armoured vehicle in northern Gaza on Friday. Pic: AP
Palestinians ride a truck carrying humanitarian aid in Gaza City. Pic: AP
The Palestinian ambassador to the United Nations (UN), Riyad Mansour, said Mr Abbas had planned to lead the delegation to the UN meetings and was expected to address the general assembly at the general debate, which begins on 23 September.
He was also expected to attend a high-level meeting co-chaired by France and Saudi Arabia on 22 September about a two-state solution, a broad idea involving Israel coexisting with an independent Palestinian state.
The State of Palestine is an observer member of the UN, meaning it can speak at meetings but not vote on resolutions.
The State of Palestine cannot vote on UN resolutions. Pic: AP
US decision ‘contravenes international law’
The Palestinian Authority “expressed its deep regret and astonishment” at the visa decision, calling it “a violation of US commitments” as the host of the UN, and claiming it “contravenes international law”.
UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said the world body would be seeking clarification in the “hope that this will be resolved”.
Hundreds of diplomats left when Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu began speaking at the general assembly in 2024. Pic: Reuters
The State Department said that the Palestinian Authority’s mission to the UN, comprising officials who are permanently based there, would not be included in the restrictions.
Under a 1947 UN agreement, the US is generally required to allow access for foreign diplomats to the UN in New York.
But Washington has said it can deny visas for security, extremism and foreign policy reasons.
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The death toll in Gaza has now risen to 63,025, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, which does not differentiate between civilians and combatants.
It also reported five more malnutrition-related deaths in the last 24 hours, bringing the total number during the war to 322, with 121 of them children.
World
Brazil implores businesses to attend major climate summit, despite ‘second thoughts’ amid Trump backlash
The Brazilian hosts of the biggest climate meeting of the year have implored businesses to attend in November, amid concerns some are backing away from the climate agenda into the shadow of Donald Trump.
In an interview with Sky News, Ana Toni, chief executive of the COP30 climate summit in November, admitted some companies were having “second thoughts” about the global switch to green economies because policymakers were creating uncertainty.
The US President Donald Trump has been attacking wind farms and waging tariff wars that could slow the transition to green energy.
Banks including HSBC and Barclays have ditched a net zero alliance set up just four years ago by Mark Carney, now the Canadian Prime Minister.
Ana Toni, Brazil’s climate secretary, is chief executive of the COP30 climate talks. Pic: Reuters
But even before Trump took office, tech companies were quietly dropping climate targets to prioritise energy-hungry AI, and other businesses were “greenhushing” their climate initiatives for fear of backlash.
In this environment, there are fears fewer business leaders will attend the annual talks, which are also being hosted in a city on the edge of the Amazon that hasn’t enough hotel rooms.
On Friday, the COP30 team wrote to business leaders urging them to “step forward, not back” and travel to Belem, despite “logistical challenges” and the “background of systemic uncertainty”.
Ana Toni told Sky News: “We are very concerned that the enabling conditions must be there so that the private sector can also deliver where they do best, which is bringing in technology, bringing innovation and accelerating the process of decarbonisation.”
In August the share price of Danish wind farm developer plummeted after the US halted its Rhode Island wind farm, while the British Tories and Reform parties are also attacking net zero.
Ana Toni met with King Charles and leaders of other COP summits at Clarence House last year. Pic: Reuters
But Ms Toni there is “nothing to panic [about], because we can see that the transition is inevitable,” citing major progress in China, India and Europe and Brazil.
Referring to the US’s withdrawal from the COP process, she said: “198 countries minus one is not zero. And we will put all our efforts of working with the 197 countries that want to go forward and want to protect their population.”
“Climate action is not only [still] cool, it is necessary,” Ms Toni said.
“We all need to face reality. We are going through a huge climate crisis… If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem. Companies understand that.”
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