Notifications can be managed in browser preferences.
Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in
Swipe for next article
Russia will retaliate to hurt Washington if Tomahawks sent to Ukraine, official says
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it’s investigating the financials of Elon Musk’s pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, ‘The A Word’, which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Russia will create “problems” for Europe if Donald Trump allows Tomahawk missiles to be sent to Ukraine, a senior Russian official has said.
This week the US president said he had “sort of” decided whether to allow Ukraine’s European allies to provide Kyiv with the subsonic long-range cruise missiles.
Andrei Kartapolov, head of the Russian parliament’s defence committee, suggested Moscow would retaliate against any country that supplies the missiles to Ukraine.
“We know these missiles very well, how they fly, how to shoot them down; we worked with them in Syria, so there is nothing new. The only problems will be for those who supply them and those who use them; that’s where the problems will be,” he said.
Russia’s deputy foreign minister also warned Washington against allowing Tomahawk missiles to be sent to Ukraine, describing it as a potentially “qualitative” change in US involvement in the war.
Trump said he wants to know what Ukraine plans to do with Tomahawks before agreeing to provide them.
A Russian overnight drone attack injured five people and damaged port and energy infrastructure in Ukraine’s southern region of Odesa, its governor said this morning.
The attack cut power to 30,000 consumers and set containers with vegetable oil and wood pellets on fire in the port, Oleh Kiper said on Telegram.
Fires broke out at fuel and energy facilities in Russia’s Volgograd region as a result of a drone attack, governor Andrei Bocharov said this morning.
Firefighters are currently extinguishing the fires, he said.
Ukraine has increased its drone attacks on Russian oil infrastructure ahead of the winter months to damage Moscow’s ability to finances its war.
Russia’s defence ministry said air defence systems had intercepted and destroyed 19 Ukrainian drones over Russian regions overnight, including nine over the Volgograd region.
The Kremlin is trying to influence US decision-making on whether to send Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine via its European partners, according to a key think-tank monitoring the war.
“Kremlin officials continued to claim that US personnel will have to directly participate in Ukrainian Tomahawk strikes and that the missiles will not affect Russia’s determination to achieve its war goals or the situation on the battlefield,” the Institute for the Study of War said.
Yesterday senior Russian officials said Moscow would create “problems” for Europe if Donald Trump allows Tomahawk missiles to be sent to Ukraine.
Andrei Kartapolov, head of the Russian parliament’s defence committee, suggested Moscow would retaliate against any country that supplies the missiles to Ukraine.
“We know these missiles very well, how they fly, how to shoot them down; we worked with them in Syria, so there is nothing new. The only problems will be for those who supply them and those who use them; that’s where the problems will be,” he said.
The supply of US-made Tomahawk cruise missiles to Ukraine will help “push Russia back,” Estonian foreign minister Margus Tsahkna said.
“Whatever we can give – without any restrictions – to Ukraine, it is helping to win the war and push Russia back,” Tsahkna said.
“So, if President Trump and the US is deciding to take down restrictions from military support, as well [as] Tomahawks, it’s just helping Ukraine to win and push Russia back,” he told ABC.
“It’s up to the US to decide that,” Tsahkna said, adding that an approval to supply these missiles will send a “very strong message” to Russia.
Russian president Vladimir Putin arrived in Tajikistan yesterday to attend meetings with leaders of other ex-Soviet republics likely to focus on regional development and their relations with Moscow.
A Kremlin announcement said Putin would take part, beginning today, in a Russia-central Asia summit, also to be attended by the leaders of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.
They will then be joined by the leaders of Armenia, Azerbaijan and Belarus at a meeting of the broader Commonwealth of Independent States bringing together former Soviet republics.
Putin has been forced to limit his foreign travel in recent years due to an order for his arrest by the International Criminal Court, issued over the deportation of Ukrainian children during the course of the Ukraine war.
Russian attacks killed three people in and around the city of Kherson in Ukraine’s south, the regional governor said.
Oleksandr Prokudin said two people were killed in a morning attack on a district of Kherson yesterday. A third died when Russian forces shelled the locality of Bilozerka, outside the city.
Ukrainian troops recaptured Kherson and parts of the region of the same name in late 2022, but Russian forces still hold large swathes of the region.
Ukrainian forces were inflicting heavy losses in a counteroffensive in eastern Donetsk region, Volodymyr Zelensky said, contrasting Vladimir Putin’s claims that Russia holds the initiative in the region.
Speaking in his nightly video address, Zelensky said he spoke for almost an hour to top commander Oleksandr Syrskyi, with “particular attention on the Dobropillia operation, our counteroffensive”.
He described heavy casualties in the area.Ukraine has pointed to successes in Dobropillia, just north of the logistics hub of Pokrovsk, one of the key targets in Russia’s slow advance westward through Donetsk region.
Ukrainian forces, Zelensky said, were “defending ourselves along all other directions,” referring specifically to Kupiansk, a largely destroyed town in northeastern Ukraine under heavy Russian assaults for months.
He also described conditions as “difficult” around Novopavlivka, farther south in Zaporizhzhia region, but said “our active defensive actions there are showing good results”.
The region has been the main theatre of the more than three and a half years of war in Ukraine.
Russia will create “problems” for Europe if Donald Trump allows Tomahawk missiles to be sent to Ukraine, a senior Russian official has said.
Andrei Kartapolov, head of the Russian parliament’s defence committee, suggested Moscow would retaliate against any country that supplies the missiles to Ukraine.
“We know these missiles very well, how they fly, how to shoot them down; we worked with them in Syria, so there is nothing new. The only problems will be for those who supply them and those who use them; that’s where the problems will be,” he said.
“Our response will be tough, ambiguous, measured, and asymmetrical. We will find ways to hurt those who cause us trouble,” said Kartapolov, the head of the Russian parliament’s defence committee.
Kartapolov, a former deputy defence minister, said he did not think Tomahawks would change anything on the battlefield even if they were supplied to Ukraine as he said they could only be given in small numbers – in tens rather than hundreds.
Russia’s deputy foreign minister also warned Washington against allowing Tomahawk missiles to be sent to Ukraine, describing it as a potentially “qualitative” change in US involvement in the war.
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in