RUSSIA’S President Vladimir Putin told a television documentary that he hoped that nuclear weapons will not be required in Ukraine.

President Putin was speaking in an out-take shown today of a documentary by Rossiya-1’s Telegram channel to mark the Russian president’s 25 years in power.

Mr Putin told interviewer Pavel Zarubin: “There has been no need to use those nuclear weapons and I hope they will not be required,” to hit back against Ukrainian strikes on Russian territory.

President Putin said: “They wanted to provoke us, wanted us to make mistakes. 

“And there was no need to use the weapons that you mentioned. I hope that it won’t be necessary.”

The Russian president said: “We have enough capabilities and means to finish what we started in 2022 with the result that Russia needs.”

The Russian president signed a new version of Russia’s nuclear doctrine in November 2024 which set out the circumstances that allow the use of the world’s largest atomic arsenal. 

The new doctrine gives Russia the option of responding to even a conventional attack with nuclear weapons.

Mr Putin also said Russia did not launch a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2014, when Crimea was annexed, because “the country was not ready for such a frontal confrontation with the entire collective West.”