Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev has said that the threat of a nuclear conflict always exists, even though no one wants war.

“No one wants any war, much less a nuclear war, which is a threat to the very existence of human civilization,” Medvedev told Sputnik, responding to a question about a possible nuclear conflict or a war between Russia and NATO.

He said he sided with those analysts who say the development of nuclear weapons has prevented a huge number of conflicts in the 20th and 21st centuries.

“[They] are right. This is true. In fact, it is what it did,” he noted.

However, he cautioned that the threat of a nuclear war is not completely ruled out: “So it is obvious that the threat always exists.”

Noting that NATO’s nuclear weapons are targeted at Russian facilities, he said the current crisis is worse than during the Cold War, because Russia’s counterparts at that time were not trying to bring the situation to a boiling point, they did not impose sanctions on industries, agriculture, and individuals.

Russia has already declared that it will only use nuclear weapons if its very existence was threatened by the West.

“We have a concept of domestic security and it’s public, you can read all the reasons for nuclear arms to be used. So if it is an existential threat for our country, then it (the nuclear arsenal) can be used in accordance with our concept,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said last Tuesday.

Source: Agencies (edited by Al-Manar English Website)