The Russian government has blamed the US for the launch of a Ukrainian missile on Sevastopol in occupied Crimea on Sunday, which left over 100 injured and at least one child dead.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Moscow said on Monday that it had summoned Ambassador Lynne Tracy to tell her that it directly blames the United States for Sunday’s missile attack.
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.
Read also: Russian troops enter base housing US military in Niger, US official says
Al Jazeera reported the Ukrainian attack on the Russian-occupied Crimea 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 based on information from US spy satellites. There has been no response from the US, which began supplying Ukraine with the missiles earlier this year.
“Such actions by Washington… will not be left without response,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Monday as it summoned the ambassador. “There will definitely be response measures.”
Read also: Russian agents caught plotting to kill Ukraine’s leader Zelensky as a gift for Putin’
Dmitry Peskov, Kremlin spokesman, called the attack “absolutely barbaric” and said in a news conference on Monday 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.
