Ukraine's top diplomat tells the United Nations a full-blown war with Russia would be 'the end of the world order as we know it'

• Ukraine's top diplomat issued a grave warning to the United Nations on Wednesday.
• Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said full-blown war with Russia will be "the end of the world order."

Ukraine's foreign minister told the United Nations on Wednesday that a full-blown war with Russia would spell the "end of the world order."

"The beginning of a large-scale war in Ukraine will be the end of the world order as we know it," Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba told the UN General Assembly in New York and later shared on Ukraine's government website.

He added: "If Russia does not get a severe, swift and decisive response now, this will mean a total bankruptcy of the international security system and international institutions which are tasked with maintaining the global security order."

Kuleba urged both the UN and the international community at-large to impose "swift, concrete, and resolute actions" as a response to the latest Russian aggression.

Russia on Monday recognized two regions in eastern Ukraine governed by Kremlin-backed separatists as independent states, shortly before President Vladimir Putin ordered troops across his borders and into Ukraine.

The move has triggered expansive sanctions from the US, UK, European Union, and other nations, targeting banks, Russian lawmakers and elites, and the country's finances.

Kuleba said the world is at a "critical juncture" in its history, and called the ongoing situation Europe's "largest security crisis" since World War II.

He said the UN needs to take "concrete actions to stop the Russian machine of war" before a "bloody" conflict ensues.

"I do not want this," he said. "Ukraine does not want this. The world does not want this."

President Joe Biden has previously said that US troops won't send to Ukraine — which is not a NATO ally — but that the US and its allies will "defend every inch of NATO territory."

Earlier on Wednesday, Kuleba wrote on Twitter that countries should impose more sanctions on Russia and Putin.

"Hit more. Hit more. Hit now," he wrote.

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky issued a similar plea on Wednesday, calling on the international community to deliver a "harsh" response to Russia's actions.