Moscow on Thursday vowed to retaliate against Ukraine for an attack on a chemical and ammunition factory in southern Russia using Western-supplied weapons.
The United States gave Kyiv permission to use longer-range missiles for strikes on Russian territory last month, in a move decried by Moscow as a dangerous escalation.
The defence ministry in Moscow accused Ukraine of firing six US-supplied ATACMS missiles and four British Storm Shadow missiles on a chemicals plant that makes rocket fuel and ammunition in the southern Rostov region.
“The actions of the Kyiv regime, supported by its Western curators, will not go unanswered,” it said in a statement on social media.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has previously threatened to strike the centre of Kyiv with a hypersonic ballistic missile if Ukraine carried on hitting Russian territory with Western weapons.
In response to previous alleged attacks with US-supplied ATACMS, Russia fired the never-before-used Oreshnik missile at the Ukrainian city of Dnipro and launched a massive aerial barrage on Ukraine’s energy grid.
Russia said the Ukrainian attack on the plant happened on Wednesday.
Ukraine has stepped up its strikes on the Rostov region — where Russia’s military headquarters for its offensive is based — in recent weeks.
In the early hours of Thursday Kyiv fired drones and missiles at an oil refinery there, triggering a large fire, according to both Ukrainian and Russian officials.
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