TEHRAN – A top Russian official accuses U.S. of waging “undeclared war” on his country as the U.S. has decided to deliver cluster bombs to Ukraine.

As the Ukraine war passes its 500th day, Nikolai Patrushev, the Secretary of the Security Council of the Russian Federation says the United States is planning and managing Ukraine’s military attacks against Russia.

The top security official has accused the U.S.-led NATO of training the Ukrainian army, providing intelligence support for Kyiv and pumping tens of billions of dollars worth of weapons for the Ukrainian military to fight Russian forces.

"Neo-Nazis grabbed power in Ukraine after the bloody coup, organized by the U.S. and its satellites. Pursuing their selfish goals, the U.S. carries out an undeclared war against Russia, using territory and population of Ukraine," Patrushev told a meeting on national security in the Southern Federal District, TASS reported.

"Today, NATO states, led by the US, continue to fund the terrorist regime in Ukraine, pump it with weapons, provide intelligence, train Ukrainian troops, plan and coordinate military operations against the Russian Army," the security official added.

President Volodymyr Zelensky has, once again, appealed to NATO leaders to finally take concrete steps towards Ukrainian membership at an upcoming summit of NATO in Lithuania.

Ukraine wants to join as quickly as possible, but divisions have emerged among NATO members over how fast and whether that decision should even be taken. Some members have expressed strong concern at Ukraine’s membership over fears it could take their own states closer to an active war with Russia.

In essence, Ukraine’s NATO membership is not moving as smoothly as Kyiv had expected or was promised before the conflict with Russia erupted in February last year.  

Speaking at a joint press conference with the President of the Czech Republic, Petr Pavel, Zelensky said “we need honesty in our relations [with NATO]".

The White House has acknowledged that Ukraine's proposed entrance into NATO will be discussed but not decided at the Western military alliance's summit next week in Vilnius.

Russia’s criticism at the U.S. and Ukraine’s frustration at NATO comes as Washington says it has decided to send cluster munitions to Ukraine to help it battle Russian forces, despite days of international outrage at the expected shipment.
President Joe Biden has defended his decision to give Ukraine cluster bombs.

The news triggered alarm among human rights groups and international organizations. Cluster munitions pose an indiscriminate and immediate threat to civilians during conflict by randomly scattering sub munitions or bomblets over a wide area. As a result, cluster bombs, like landmines, pose a serious risk to civilians long after their use. Unexploded ordnance from cluster bombs can especially kill and maim children who confuse them for toys, years or even decades after the munitions were fired.

Israel has been widely condemned for using cluster munitions against the Palestinians, decades ago, whose effects are still being felt today.

President Joe Biden's national security adviser tried to lay out the case, saying “I'm not going to stand up here and say it is easy. It's a difficult decision. It's a decision we deferred. It's a decision that required a real hard look at the potential harm to civilians. And when we put all of that together, there was a unanimous recommendation from the national security team and President Biden ultimately decided.”

U.S. NATO allies such as Germany, Britain and Spain have opposed the move. The British prime minister suggested the country "discourages" the use of cluster bombs.

Organizations such as Human Rights Watch had urged the U.S. not to supply them to the warzone.

More than 120 countries have signed a convention banning cluster bombs. A 2009 law also bans the exports of U.S. cluster munitions with bomblet failure rates higher than 1%, which covers virtually all of the U.S. military stockpile.

The UN Spokesperson Farhan Haq has said “the [UN] Secretary General (Antonio Guterres) supports the Convention on Cluster Munitions, which, as you know, was adopted 15 years ago. And he wants countries to abide by the terms of that convention. And so as a result, of course, he does not want there to be continued use of cluster munitions on the battlefield.”

However, Biden can waive prohibitions around the munitions as Trump did in January 2021 to allow the export of cluster munitions technology to South Korea.

A Pentagon spokesman said the Biden administration is shipping the bombs to Ukraine as part of Washington’s latest military package to Ukraine that worth $800 million.

The U.S. military claims cluster munitions would be useful, in its counter-offensive, for Ukraine despite congressional opposition and concerns among Washington’s allies.

In addition, Ukraine will receive munitions for High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS) and ground vehicles such as Bradley fighting vehicles and Stryker armored personnel carriers, officials said.

The package will be funded using the Presidential Drawdown Authority, which authorizes Biden to transfer articles and services from U.S. stocks without congressional approval during an “emergency”.

The latest military assistance to Ukraine means the U.S. has sent upwards of $40 billion dollars’ worth of weapons to Kyiv on top of leading the unpresented sanctions regime against Russia, freezing more than $300 billion of Russian assets and banning exports of its energy supplies.

Ukraine has also been pushing for new Western fighter planes, including F-16s, as it pursues a counteroffensive that experts say is failing.

Meanwhile, at a UN Security Council meeting, that was aimed as discussing the implementation of the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement, member states denounced Ukraine's inclusion in the session, saying it was an attempt at diverting attention away from the JCPOA, in a bid to spread false allegations against Iran.

Representatives from the U.S., UK and the head of the EU delegation denounced Moscow for allegedly using Iranian unmanned aerial vehicles in its conflict against Kyiv.

Russia and Iran have repeatedly denounced the allegations, accusing the West of trying to divert attention from the crisis in Ukraine, with their own massive arms shipments to the warzone.

Russian Ambassador to the United Nations, Vassily Nebenzia, denounced the participation of Ukraine at the meeting, saying "the invitation for participation in today's meeting in violation of the longstanding practice, an invitation to Ukraine, which is not a party to the nuclear deal, is a political, politicized, provocative step geared towards undermining a constructive discussion on 22/31 at the Security Council. This is yet another stain on the reputation of London as president of the Security Council."

Nebenzia also slammed statements made by the U.S. representative at the session saying that "clearly, the pathos and emotionally charged statement of the U.S. representative was clearly intended to distract attention from the endless flows of weapons provided by Washington to the Kyiv regime."

Iran’s Ambassador to the UN, Amir Saeed Iravani, said "we do not recognize the presence of Ukraine in this meeting, and we have no intention of addressing the baseless allegations put forward by the representative of Ukraine or certain member states against my country during this meeting regarding the ongoing conflict in Ukraine."

The Iranian ambassador also said "Certain council members are deliberately attempting to divert international attention away from the root causes of the current situation concerning the implementation of the JCPOA and the ongoing material violation of Resolution 22/31 by the United States since the legitimate withdrawal from the agreement in 2018."

Iran has repeatedly said it has sent drones to Russia, but they have not been used in the Ukraine crisis. Tehran has repeatedly asked for evidence to prove the Western and Ukrainian claims.