Keir Starmer Putin treats Russians like meat in a mill

Vladimir Putin is treating his own citizens like “pieces of meat to be thrown into the grinder,” Keir Starmer said as he launched his most forceful attack yet on the Russian leader.

In his first speech to the United Nations Security Council in New York, the prime minister condemned Moscow’s “illegal” invasion of Ukraine, which he said had caused “enormous human suffering”.

“More than 35,000 civilians have been killed or wounded, six million people have been forced to flee and nearly 20,000 Ukrainian children have been forcibly deported – abducted, to put it bluntly,” he said.

The prime minister said 600,000 Russian soldiers have been killed or wounded since the war began in February 2022.

And referring to the Russian representative in the Security Council, he added: “The UN Charter – which they are here to defend – speaks of human dignity. Not treating your own citizens like pieces of meat that you throw into the grinder.”

His comments were reminiscent of those of former Conservative Party defence secretary Ben Wallace, who said Putin would continue to “sacrifice” the Russians rather than resort to nuclear weapons in the war in Ukraine, a former British defence minister said.

The West is currently considering whether to allow Ukraine to deploy long-range missiles in Russia, fearing that Moscow could respond with its own nuclear power.

But Ben Wallace, who stood down as a Conservative MP at the general election, played down concerns that the war between Ukraine and Russia could escalate to such heights on Wednesday.

Speaking to Times Radio presenter Andrew Neil, Wallace said it would be a “global game changer” if Putin chose to use nuclear weapons, as they have not been used since World War II and have become an effective deterrent.

“The international community will not tolerate the use of a nuclear weapon,” he said, adding that “it would be a very horrific event, regardless of its scale.”

If Putin actually uses nuclear weapons, he said, “it would ultimately force the Western powers to think about how to reconsider the nuclear taboo.”

But Wallace argued that the Russian president has been deterred from going to such extremes in the past by his allies in China and India, “because they see the difficulty of it”.

“I don’t think he’s going there,” he concluded.

“I think he’s simply going to rely on the international community and on a failed Trump presidency, and I think he’s also going to rely on the fact that he can just sacrifice more of his own people.”

Neil asked, “Because he doesn’t care?”

“He doesn’t care,” Wallace agreed.

Former US President Donald Trump is running for re-election and has repeatedly said he would be much softer on Russia if he were to return to the White House.

He has said only that he wants the war between Ukraine and Russia to end, but he has not specified who should emerge as the winner, raising fears that Kiev will cede land to Putin to end the conflict.

Meanwhile, the death toll in Russia continues to rise. According to the British Ministry of Defence, more than 600,000 Russian casualties have been reported since the war began.

Putin recently announced plans to expand his military for the third time since invading Ukraine, calling for Russia to have 1.5 million active troops in its armed forces, making it the world’s second-largest military power.

But Britain’s Ministry of Defence claimed on Tuesday that “poorly trained Russian soldiers are being used as cannon fodder”.