Summary of the day so far
The US president, Joe Biden, has permitted Ukraine to use US-made Atacms ballistic missiles against Russian and North Korean forces inside Russian territory. Officials in Washington told reporters the weapons could be used in the region of Kursk, where Kyiv has launched an incursion, but that Biden may agree to their deployment elsewhere before Donald Trump comes to power in January.
The Kremlin said the US’s decision represented an escalation of the conflict. “It is clear that the outgoing administration in Washington intends to take steps to continue to add fuel to the fire and to further inflame tensions around this conflict,” Vladimir Putin’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters. “This decision is reckless, dangerous, aimed at a qualitative change, a qualitative increase in the level of involvement of the United States.” The Russian foreign ministry said that Ukraine’s use of long-range missiles to attack Russian territory, with US and allied support, would fundamentally alter the nature of the war and trigger “an adequate and tangible” response from Russia.
The German tabloid Bild is reported on what it calls a “top secret” delivery to Ukraine of 4,000 strike drones, developed by the German artificial intelligence firm Helsing. The company reportedly received the contract from the Ukraine defence ministry in September and the order has been paid for out of a German government fund.
Ukraine’s state emergency services said that at least 10 people were killed and 43 people were injured in a Russian attack on Odesa, Ukraine’s Black Sea port city.
The Kremlin rejected a reported peace proposal from the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, to be put forward at the G20 summit in Brazil, to freeze hostilities at the current positions of both parties. Erdoğan’s plan reportedly consists of: freezing the frontline as it is, Ukraine agreeing not to join Nato for at least ten years, supplying Ukraine with weapons to provide for its defence and placing international peacekeepers in a demilitarised buffer zone in the Donbas. Earlier, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov dismissed reports that Erdoğan was suggesting a freeze of the current tactical situation as a condition that would be “unacceptable” to the Russian Federation.
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Russia vows 'palpable response' if Ukraine uses long-range missiles on its territory
Moscow has warned of an “appropriate response” if Ukraine fires western-supplied long-range missiles against Russian territory, hours after Joe Biden gave Kyiv permission for such strikes.
Russia’s foreign ministry said in a statement on Monday:
Kyiv’s use of long-range missiles to attack our territory would represent the direct involvement of the United States and its satellites in hostilities against Russia, as well as a radical change in the essence and nature of the conflict …
Russia’s response in such a case will be appropriate and palpable.
The US decision is being justified by the presence of North Korean troops fighting alongside Russia against Ukraine. Briefings to US media outlets said permission to use the missiles would be limited to the Kursk region, where Ukraine launched an incursion into Russia in the summer, my colleagues Pjotr Sauer and Dan Sabbagh, write in this story.
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