CLEARLY none of us are experts when it comes to Ukraine, but most of us have a view on the recent actions and statements of President Trump.

My knowledge of Ukraine was that they produced about one third of the wheat needed to feed Europe and Asia and that was about it.

A report from the world’s Arms Control Association has greatly improved my understanding of the present war in Ukraine.

I thought that others might like to be similarly aware of the realities, and why that conflict is such an important issue to us all.

In 1991, at the time of Ukraine declaring independence from Russia, Ukraine held the third largest arsenal of nuclear weapons in the world.

In 1990 Ukraine made a Declaration of Sovereignty not to accept, produce or acquire nuclear weapons, supporting efforts to join the 1968 nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT).

This meant that Ukraine gave up to Russia 1900 nuclear warheads, 176 intercontinental ballistic missiles and 44 strategic bombers in order to become accepted in the world as a non-nuclear state.

In 1991 the Minsk Agreement was signed, agreeing that the Russian government would be given charge over all these nuclear armaments.

The agreement stated that the states of Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan would have a right to veto their use until their dismantling date was set for the end of 1994.

Then in 1992 the Lisbon Protocol sought to return all nuclear weapons in Belarus and Kazakhstan to Russia with assurances from other world powers.

In 2014 Russia then annexed Crimea from Ukraine followed by “military exercises” as a prelude to the present large-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Ukraine is now asking what happened to the assurances it received when it gave up weapons to become a non-nuclear state.

The nation was told its rights and independence would be protected.

These assurances, which came from the USA and other global powers, now look like hollow promises under the new Trump presidency.

At this point other nations must be questioning any guarantees they have from the USA in order to protect their country.

We are indeed in difficult times when it comes to believing guarantees of help in order to protect smaller states from aggression by a predator state.

By John BLACKBOURN