Russia has blamed the United States for a “barbaric” attack in Crimea that relied on US-provided missiles and killed at least four, including children, and wounded 151 others.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry summoned US Ambassador Lynne Tracy on Monday and accused the US of waging a “proxy war” and said retaliatory measures would “definitely follow”.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Moscow has persistently claimed that it is effectively fighting a proxy war with the West. Speaking to reporters on Monday, US Department of State spokesperson Matthew Miller said that the US provides Ukraine with weapons so that it can defend its sovereignty and that Tracy conveyed regret over any civilian loss of life.
A recent decision by the US allowing Ukraine to use weapons it supplies on targets inside Russian territory risks escalation and will incur “consequences”, the Kremlin said.
The Ukrainian attack on the Russian-occupied Crimean Peninsula was conducted with five US-supplied Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) missiles, the Russian Ministry of Defence said on Sunday.
It added that four had been shot down and that a fifth had detonated in midair. The ministry claimed that US specialists had set the missiles’ flight coordinates on the basis of information from US spy satellites. There has been no response from the US, which began supplying Ukraine with the missiles earlier this year. There was no immediate response from Kyiv.
“Such actions by Washington … will not be left without response,” Russia’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Monday as it summoned the ambassador. “There will definitely be response measures.”
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called the attack “absolutely barbaric” and said in a news conference that Moscow would react to the US involvement.
“You should ask my colleagues in Europe, and above all in Washington … why their governments are killing Russian children,” he suggested to reporters present.
‘Consequences’
Peskov also referred to comments by Russian President Vladimir Putin about arming countries to potentially launch strikes on Western targets.
Last week, he agreed to a military alliance pact with North Korea, causing alarm among Western allies.
Russian officials have recently warned that the Ukraine war is entering its most dangerous phase to date. Putin has repeatedly warned of the risk of a much broader war involving the world’s nuclear powers.
But directly blaming the US for a deadly attack on Crimea – which Russia annexed in 2014 and now considers to be Russian territory, although most of the world considers it to be part of Ukraine – is a step further.
“We perfectly understand who is behind this,” Peskov said, adding that it was clear who supplied weapons to Ukraine, aimed them and provided data for them.
“Of course, the involvement of the United States in the fighting, as a result of which peaceful Russians are dying, cannot but have consequences,” Peskov said. “Which ones exactly, time will tell”.
