Sending troops to Ukraine means...: Putin's warning to Europe - Rediff

Putin has issued a stark warning to European nations, declaring that any deployment of troops to Ukraine would be met with 'war with Russia'.

Amid the ongoing conflict with Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned European nations against sending troops to Kyiv, clarifying that the nation does not threaten European countries.

Speaking to reporters in New Delhi on the sidelines of the 2026 BRICS Summit, Putin affirmed that sending troops to Ukraine will mean "war with Russia."

Putin's Warning on Ukraine

"There is no such threat, and there has never been. We are not threatening European countries, nor are we going to threaten them. Why would we? No one seems to even consider that we have no grounds for any conflict with Europe. All issues were settled as a result of the Second World War. And what happened later, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, was done with the consent of the Russian Federation as the successor of the Soviet Union. Everything that runs counter to those arrangements runs counter to our interests and does not comply with the fundamental principles of international law and the UN Charter," Putin said.

"Now they are talking about how they are thinking about bringing troops to the territory of Ukraine. This means war with Russia," the Russian President added.

The war between Russia and Ukraine began in February 2022, and has entered its fifth year. While several European nations have extended support to Ukraine, the US has attempted a mediator role, holding talks between the two nations.

Earlier this month, US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law of US President Donald Trump, Jared Kushner, met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy after their visit to Moscow.

Putin is in India to attend the 18th BRICS Summit.

Critique of Western Policies

Commenting on the Alternative for Germany (AfD) surging in state elections in Germany's Saxony-Anhalt, Putin said that what is happening in Europe is the result of "systemic mistakes" by the West in politics, security and the economy.

"I think that everything that is now happening in Europe as a whole is the result of systemic mistakes by the so-called West, or, more precisely, by the West's globalists, in the areas of politics, security, and the economy," he said.

"Everyone makes mistakes. We have made quite a few mistakes ourselves, as has the rest of the world. But the problem for the West's globalists is that, after the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union, they felt themselves to be at the 'top of Olympus' and apparently believed that: first, everything was permitted to them; and second, that they were the ones who never make mistakes," he added.

German Election Shock

Earlier in September, Germany's far-right Alternative for Germany emerged as the largest party in the state election in Saxony-Anhalt, according to exit polls, marking the first time since World War II that a far-right party has topped a state election in the country.

The AfD has so far never been part of a governing coalition in any of Germany's 16 states or at the federal level. Mainstream political parties have maintained a refusal to cooperate with the party, a political barrier commonly referred to as the "firewall".

The result is also a setback for German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and his centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU), which finished a distant second in Saxony-Anhalt.