Secretary of State Antony Blinken says the U.S. does “not have a strategy for regime change in Russia or anywhere else for that matter,” after President Joe Biden on Saturday had said Russian President Vladimir Putin “cannot remain in power.”
“I think the president, the White House, made the point last night that, quite simply, President Putin cannot be empowered to wage war or engage in aggression against Ukraine or anyone else,” Blinken said Sunday during a visit to Jerusalem.
Biden declared Saturday in Poland that the West’s defense of Ukraine against Russia’s invasion is vital to protect democracy worldwide for generations to come.
“The test of this moment is the test of all time,” Biden said in a speech delivered at the Royal Castle, a Warsaw landmark that was destroyed in World War II and rebuilt using the rubble in the 1970s and ‘80s.
Biden said Russia’s war against Ukraine is “an example of one of the oldest human impulses, using brute force and disinformation to satisfy a craving for absolute power and control.”
“It’s nothing less than a direct challenge to the rule-based international order established since the end World War II,” Biden added.
On the subject of Putin, Biden said “For God’s sake, this man cannot remain in power.”
Meanwhile, in neighboring Ukraine’s western Lviv region Saturday, five people were injured in two rocket attacks. Governor Maksym Kozytskyy said two rockets hit a fuel depot and another two struck a military factory.
The Associated Press is reporting that a man was detained at one of the sites, suspected of being a spy for Russia.
“With today’s blows,” Lviv Mayor Andriy Sadoviy said in a televised address, “the aggressor sends greetings to President Biden, who is in Poland.”
Lviv is a city of 700,000 that has become a destination for refugees and had been largely spared from major attacks until Saturday.
The U.S. president’s comments in Warsaw came shortly after meeting with Polish President Andrzej Duda and other Polish officials to discuss Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, as Russia appears to have shifted its military offensive away from Ukraine’s capital of Kyiv and toward the country’s east.
Biden listed many of the crippling financial sanctions Western nations have imposed on Russia in response to its invasion, saying they have “the power to inflict damage that rivals military might.”
Biden warned Russian President Vladimir Putin not to “even think about moving on one inch of NATO territory.” He reminded Putin the alliance has “a sacred obligation … to defend every inch of NATO territory.”
Duda, whose country borders Ukraine, said earlier that “Polish-American relations are flourishing” and Russia’s war against Ukraine underscored the importance of a unified NATO.
“Poles have a great feeling of danger because we know what Russian imperialism and an attack by the Russian army means. Because our grandparents and great-grandparents, sometimes our parents, survived it,” Duda said.
Poland, a NATO member, has accepted more than 2 million of the 3.8 million Ukrainian refugees who have fled their country, sparking a humanitarian crisis.
Biden was accompanied by Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski and Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki during a visit with refugees Saturday in a Warsaw stadium to discuss humanitarian relief efforts. Biden previously committed to accommodate up to 100,000 Ukrainian refugees in the U.S. /VOA/