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The Kremlin has accused President Joe Biden of, “adding fuel to the fire” after it was reported he had given his approval to Ukraine using U.S.-made missiles to strike targets deep inside Russia.
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov is reported by the BBC to have said on Monday that the Biden administration was “continuing to stoke tension around this conflict.”
According to anonymous U.S. officials who spoke to media outlets, Biden has authorized Ukraine to use long-range missiles provided by the Pentagon to strike targets in the Russian region of Kursk.
Peskov told the Tass news agency, “If such a decision has indeed been formulated and communicated to the Kyiv regime, then, of course, this is a qualitatively new round of escalation of tensions, and a qualitatively new situation in terms of the involvement of the United States in this conflict.”
The Tass news agency, on its Telegram channel, said Peskov had described the idea of missile strikes inside Russia as “dangerous and provocative.”
Peskov referred journalists to a statement made by Putin in September, in which he said allowing Ukraine to target Russia would change “the very nature of the conflict dramatically.”
But Peskov said Putin was “open to any communication” but had not yet spoken to French President Emmanuel Macron, who was reported to be planning to call the Russian leader.
The UK and France have both supplied Storm Shadow missiles to Ukraine, which could be used to hit targets in Russia, but so far, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Macron have not given permission.
Starmer said they “need to double down” on support for Ukraine and insisted that the issue was “top” of his agenda at this week’s G20 summit in Brazil.
Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022 and recently deployed thousands of North Korean troops to the frontline, fighting alongside Russian forces.
Ukrainian forces launched a significant cross-border operation into Russia’s region of Kursk earlier this year. Intense fighting is ongoing as Russian forces attempt to reclaim lost territory. Ukraine seized several settlements and is still holding strategic positions.
In response, Russia has allowed 11,000 North Korean troops, volunteered by Pyongyang, to deploy on the frontline in the Kursk region to aid its fight.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has been pressuring the United States and NATO to allow his forces to use army tactical missile systems they have been supplied with to hit targets deep inside Russia, arguing Moscow has already escalated the conflict with the North Korean deployment.
On Monday, Zelenskyy said “long-range capabilities” were a vital part of his “victory plan,” which he fleshed out in the Ukrainian Parliament last month.
‘Missiles Will Speak for Themselves’
“There’s been much said in the media today that we have received approval to take relative actions. But strikes are not carried out with words. These things are not announced. The missiles will speak for themselves,” Zelenskyy said on Monday.
Tass also reported that Viktor Bondarev, a senior Russian senator and former Russian air force commander-in-chief, said, “Russia has sufficient advanced capabilities to counter attacks by any weapons, including long-range weapons.”
Earlier this month, 34 Ukrainian drones attacked targets in Moscow, but the Russian defense ministry claimed the attack had been “thwarted.”
The defense ministry said the Ukrainians targeted the Kursk, Bryansk, Tula, Oryol, and Kaluga regions.
The Kremlin’s own Telegram channel has so far not commented on the reports about Biden approving missile strikes.
On Monday, it published photographs of Putin holding a “working meeting” with the governor of the Zaporozhye (Zaporizhzhia) region in occupied Ukraine, Yevgeny Balitsky.
“Relief payments for people who lost their homes [in the fighting] and measures to ensure the security of the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant were also discussed,” it reported.
The war in Ukraine claimed more civilian casualties on Sunday.
Ukrainian officials said a Russian ballistic missile packed with cluster munitions hit a residential area in the city of Sumy, killing nine adults and two children and injuring 84 others.
The Sumy regional prosecutor’s office said the children killed were a 9-year-old boy and a girl aged 14 and that six other children had been critically injured.
The Associated Press and PA Media contributed to this report.
