Britain warned Vladimir Putin on Tuesday that “all possible options are on the table” about how the West would respond to his use of chemical weapons amid claims that such an attack had already been launched in Mariupol.
Armed forces minister James Heappey did not rule out that British or Nato troops could be deployed in Ukraine if the Kremlin used chemical weapons as it desperately seeks to capture land in the east of the country. Chemical weapons experts from the US, UK and their allies, as well as in Ukraine, were this morning urgently seeking to identify whether Ukrainian fighters holding out in the besieged port city had been targeted.
