Canada's Harper Says Putin's Russia Spurs Nations to 'Arm to Teeth'

Canada's premier said Saturday that Russian President Vladimir Putin's decision to send troops into Crimea and annex it from Ukraine encourages aggrieved nations to "arm themselves to the teeth".

Stephen Harper, the first leader from the Group of Seven top industrialized powers to visit Kiev since last month's fall of Ukraine's pro-Kremlin regime, said the consequences of Putin's actions "will be felt far beyond the borders of Ukraine or even the European continent itself".

He cited a 1994 agreement under which Ukraine gave up its Soviet-era nuclear weapons in return for sovereignty guarantees from Russia and Western powers as the reason why some nations may now decide to stock up on nuclear weapons.

"By his open repudiation of the Budapest memorandum, President Putin has undermined international confidence in the protection afforded by such agreements," the Canadian leader said.

"Ukraine relinquished the nuclear weapons it inherited from the former Soviet Union on the basis of an explicit Russian guarantee of its territorial integrity.

"By breaching that guarantee, President Putin has provided a rationale for those elsewhere, who needed little more encouragement than that already furnished by pride or grievance, to arm themselves to the teeth."

Canada, with the world's third-largest population of ethnic Ukrainians, was the first Western power to recognize the ex-Soviet state's independence in 1991.

It has adopted a tough line against Moscow over Crimea, suspending joint military exercises with Russia, condemning as "illegal" a Moscow-backed referendum in the peninsula on joining Russia, and slapping sanctions on Russian and Crimean senior officials.

Harper was speaking in Kiev two days before heading to an emergency meeting of the G7 to discuss the Crimea crisis on the sidelines of the Nuclear Security Summit (NSS) in The Hague.

And the Canadian leader said he hoped the bloc, which has already suspended meetings with Russia, would take further "strong action" against Moscow "for the long term".

"I think it is important that we in the free world not accept the occupation of Crimea," he said at a joint news conference with Ukraine's interim prime minister, Arseniy Yatsenyuk.

Harper said the international community should ensure there was "no return to business as usual (for Russia) until the occupation of Crimea ends".

Yatsenyuk, for his part, called on the international community to hold Russia to account over Crimea in order ensure global security.

"In 1994, my country abandoned, by its free will, the nuclear weapon," he said, noting that Ukraine had the world's third largest nuclear arsenal at the time.

"And what has happened (since is that) one of the signatories of this... Budapest memorandum invaded my country," Yatsenyuk said.

This in turn has undermined the "entire global nuclear non-proliferation system," he told reporters.

"It would be very difficult to convince anyone in the world, starting with Iran, and then North Korea, to give up its nuclear weapons."

G7 leaders from Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States are expected to meet on Monday, leaving Tuesday free to discuss securing the world's stocks of nuclear material at the NSS gathering in The Hague.