Russia could use its new Oreshnik hypersonic missile to attack ‘decision centers’ in kyiv in response to Western missile launches by Ukraine against Russian territory, President Vladimir Putin said Thursday.
Russia has so far not attacked Ukrainian government ministries, parliament or the president’s office during the 33-month war.
kyiv is heavily protected by air defenses, but Putin says the Oreshnik, which Russia first fired on a Ukrainian city last week, is incapable of being intercepted, a claim greeted with skepticism by Western experts .
“Of course, we will respond to ongoing attacks on Russian territory with Western-made long-range missiles, as we have already indicated, and perhaps even continue testing the Oreshnik in combat conditions , as was done on November 21,” Putin told leaders of a security alliance of former Soviet countries at a summit in Kazakhstan.
“Currently, the Ministry of Defense and the General Staff select targets for attack on Ukrainian territory. These can be military installations, defense and industrial enterprises or decision-making centers in kyiv,” he declared.
Last night’s attack, a response
Putin said Russia’s latest massive overnight attack in Ukraine was also a response to kyiv’s use of US ATACMS ballistic missiles. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia used cruise missiles equipped with cluster munitions in the attack, which cut power to more than a million people, calling it a “despicable escalation.”
Russia says Ukraine first fired ATACMS into western Russia on November 19, prompting it to respond two days later by firing the Oreshnik, a new intermediate-range missile , in the Ukrainian city of Dnipro.
Since then, Russia claims that Ukraine fired more ATACMS at its Kursk region on November 23-25 and also attacked Russia with British Storm Shadow cruise missiles, after the United States and Great -Brittany first agreed to authorize kyiv’s attacks deep into Russian territory with these weapons.
Putin reiterated in his remarks at the summit that this meant, from Moscow’s perspective, the West’s “direct participation” in an armed conflict with Russia.
