Ukrainian armed forces fired UK-supplied Storm Shadow missiles into Russia for the first time on Wednesday, the second long-range assault after the US approved their usage earlier this week.
Officials said the use of the Storm Shadows, Britain’s equivalent of the US Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS), was approved in direct response to the presence of thousands of North Korean Troops in the Kursk region, Bloomberg reports.
UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer alluded to the Storm Shadows’ immediate use during Tuesday’s G20 summit, vowing that Britain would “double down” its support for Ukraine after President Joe Biden approved the use of ATACMS against the Kremlin.
“We need to make sure Ukraine has what is necessary for as long as necessary because we cannot allow Putin to win this war,” Starmer said.
Local reports claim the Storm Shadows, which of a range of about 155 miles, struck somewhere in the Kursk region, where Russia is trying to take back the territory occupied by Ukraine following August’s surprise counter-invasion.
Ukrainian Minister of Defense Rustem Umerov declined to comment on reports of the Storm Shadow missiles during a news conference but said Kyiv would use whatever it could to defend itself from the Russian invasion.
Starmer also declined to comment on the reports.
The Kremlin did not immediately respond to the attack, but Putin had accused Biden earlier on Wednesday of trying to escalate the war by approving the use of the ATACMS against Moscow.
Prior to Biden’s U-turn on long-range missile usage in Russia, the UK had prohibited Ukraine from using the Storm Shadow across the border, with the weapon limited to attacking Russian military targets in the illegally annexed Crimea.
Wednesday’s long-range attack comes just a day after Kyiv launched a barrage of US-made missiles in the Bryansk region, with one of the rockets bypassing Russia’s air defense systems and destroying another military facility.
“The destruction of ammunition depots will continue for the army of the Russian occupiers in order to stop the armed aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine,” the military touted after Tuesday’s strike.
Following the approval of the ATACMS, Putin issued a warning to the United States as he signed a law Tuesday allowing for a nuclear strike in retaliation for a long-range missile attack fired by a country that either is or is backed by a nuclear power.
With Post wires
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