France has carried out its first test firing of an updated nuclear-capable missile, the ASMPA-R, designed to be launched by a Rafale fighter jet, according to the French defence minister, Sebastien Lecornu. It came a day after Russia said it began nuclear drills in its southern military district, which stretches from Russia into occupied Ukrainian territory. The announcement of Russian drills is partly directed at France after its president, Emmanuel Macron, said he would not rule out sending in troops on Ukraine’s side.
Lecornu said the missile was fired without a warhead by a plane in an exercise “above national territory … at the end of a flight representing a nuclear air raid”. He congratulated “all the forces, [defence] ministry teams and industrial partners involved” in a “long-planned” operation. France plans to spend about 13% of its military budget over the coming years on its independent nuclear capability, including upgrading to next-generation air-launched missiles by 2035.
“Lethal aid is now flowing from China to Russia and into Ukraine,” Grant Shapps, the British defence secretary, told a London conference on Wednesday. “Today I can reveal that we have evidence that Russia and China are collaborating on combat equipment for use in Ukraine,” he said, attributing the information to “US and British defence intelligence”.
In the US, however, Joe Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan said that while there were concerns China might “provide weapons directly – lethal assistance – to Russia … we have not seen that to date”. The US did have a “concern about what China’s doing to fuel Russia’s war machine, not giving weapons directly, but providing inputs to Russia’s defence industrial base”.
Shapps said Nato needed to “wake up” and bolster defence spending across the alliance. He argued that democratic states should make a “full-throated case” for freedoms that are dependent on the international order, meaning “we need more allies and partners” worldwide.
Ukraine has equipped some of its naval drones with Grad multiple rocket launching systems and used them to fire at Russian positions in combat, a Ukrainian intelligence source has told Reuters. The “Sea Babies” had been used this week to attack Russian positions on the Kinburn Spit in Ukraine’s southern region of Mykolaiv.
A Russian airstrike on Kharkiv city on Wednesday destroyed a cafe, damaged a nearby residential building and set a petrol station ablaze. Local officials said 10 people were wounded, including, said regional prosecutors, a trolleybus driver who had both legs amputated. Russia used a UMPB D-30 guided bomb launched from the bordering Belgorod region, prosecutors said.
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, made a plea for defences against the guided bombs, which had become the “the main instrument” used in Russian attacks. “In countering Russian bombs much remains to be done … Ukraine needs systems and tactics that will allow us to protect our positions, our cities and our communities.”
The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, is pushing a proposal in the Biden administration to let Ukraine fire American weapons into Russia, the New York Times has reported. It comes after Blinken visited Ukraine last week and said the US did not encourage striking into Russia but it should be up to the Ukrainians to decide. Questioned by reporters on Wednesday, Mike Johnson, the US House speaker, said: “I think they need to allow Ukraine to prosecute the war the way they see fit. They need to be able to fight back. And I think us trying to micromanage the effort there it’s not a good policy for us.”
⚡️Asked @SpeakerJohnson about using US weapons on the RU territory?
— Kateryna Lisunova (@KaterynaLis) May 22, 2024
⁰SPEAKER: I think, they need to allow Ukraine to prosecute the war the way they see fits. They need to be able to fight back. And I think us trying to micromanage the effort there it’s not a good policy for us. pic.twitter.com/71iLMTa9p8
A Russian drone dropped explosives on a police car that was on its way to evacuate civilians in Vovchansk, killing one officer, said the Ukrainian interior minister, Ihor Klymenko. A video posted by the minister online by Klymenko showed what he said was a drone bombing the car. Reuters could not independently verify Klymenko’s statement. There was no immediate comment from Russia.
Russia said there were Ukrainian attacks on its Belgorod region across the border from Ukraine, and in the occupied eastern Ukrainian city of Lysychansk, killing up to three people.
The Swedish government has announced additional military support to Ukraine totalling 75 billion crowns (US$7bn) over three years. Ukraine’s defence minister, Rustem Umerov, said Swedish-made weapons had “already proven themselves on the battlefield … Archers and CV-90s help Ukrainian defenders drive the enemy out of our land.”
