Dmitri Peskov accuses Biden of “adding fuel to the fire” by authorizing the use of long-range weapons. Putin had already warned that authorization would mean NATO involvement in the conflict.
Follow our live blog on the war in Ukraine here.
This Monday, Russia accused the President of the United States, Joe Biden, of “adding fuel to the fire” if it is confirmed that he authorized Ukraine to use long-range missiles in Russian territory.
If officially confirmed by Washington, this authorization will lead to “a fundamentally new situation in terms of US involvement in this conflict“, warned the Kremlin (presidency) spokesman, Dmitri Peskov, quoted by the French agency AFP.
Russian President Vladimir Putin warned in September that this Western authorization “would mean nothing less than the direct participation of NATO countries in the war in Ukraine.”
Washington’s decision was announced on Sunday by US media and confirmed to AFP by a US official.
The decision was announced after another weekend of massive and deadly Russian attacks on Ukraine and just weeks before the transfer of power between the outgoing president and Donald Trump.
Citing Putin, the Kremlin spokesman warned that the attacks on Russian territory “It will not be carried out by Ukraine, but by the countries that give their authorization.“.
He said the coordinates of the target “are not provided by the Ukrainian military, but by experts from these Western countries,” which “radically changes the nature” of their involvement in the conflict.
“It is obvious that the outgoing administration in Washington intends to take measures to further add fuel to the fire and cause a further rise in tensions,” Peskov said.
The Biden administration has been kyiv’s main supporter, allowing Ukrainian forces to resist Russian troops since Putin ordered the attack on Ukraine in February 2022.
Washington’s continued support was called into question with the election to the presidency of Trump, whose campaign statements have raised fears in Ukraine that he intends to force an end to the fighting at the cost of unacceptable concessions to kyiv.
Moscow, whose troops have been advancing for several months in various segments of the front line, warned that any talk about ending the fighting can only be based on “new territorial realities.”
Since the start of the war, Russia has declared the Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhia and Kherson annexed to its territory, after having done the same with Crimea in 2014.
Ukraine demands the withdrawal of Russian troops from all its territory, including the five regions annexed by Russia.
Source: Observadora
