Ukraine has been seeking to involve its NATO allies in a direct confrontation with Russia to try and turn around the conflict, a Chinese military expert told the Global Times on Sunday.
"Kiev will always pay efforts to drag its NATO allies to directly fight with Russian troops in Ukraine, as this is probably the only way for Kiev to turn around the current situation," Song Zhongping told the Chinese newspaper, TASS reports.
Washington will not be used by Kiev, but will keep using Kiev to undermine Moscow, he added.
Commenting on plans to send tanks and other weapons to Ukraine, Song said, "Russia won’t wait and see Ukraine troops to get fully armed by those NATO weapons."
"As long as NATO gets involved more directly, the situation would immediately turn into a confrontation between NATO and Russia, and the outbreak of World War III in Europe would become an event with high possibility," the expert said.
On January 25, the US administration announced plans to supply 31 M1 Abrams tanks to Kiev. In its turn, the German government confirmed that it would send 14 Leopard 2 tanks from its stockpiles to Ukraine and authorize their re-export by other countries.
