Russia has vowed retaliation after claiming to have shot down eight US-made ATACMS missiles launched by Ukraine on Saturday morning.
Moscow views the use of such missiles, which have a range of up to 300 kilometers (186 miles), as a significant escalation.
Russia’s air defenses shot down eight ballistic missiles and 72 aircraft-type unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), according to the Ministry of Defense. The publication stated that “these actions by the Kyiv regime, which is supported by Western curators, will be met with retaliation.”
According to the statement, several drones were destroyed in the northwestern Leningrad region, as well as one in Kursk, where Ukraine launched a surprise attack late last summer.
In November, outgoing US President Joe Biden approved Kyiv’s use of ATACMS, citing the need to respond to Russia’s expansion of the conflict by deploying North Korean troops.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has threatened to respond to Ukrainian ATACMS strikes with Russia’s new nuclear-capable ballistic missile “Oreshnik.”
Last month, Putin suggested that it could be launched at Kyiv as a test of Western-supplied air defense systems.
On the morning of November 21, the experimental weapon was launched for the first time, targeting Ukraine’s Dnipro region.
According to Russian state media agency TASS, the Ukrainian drone attacks prompted the implementation of temporary restrictions at St. Petersburg’s airport.
Aleksandr Drozdenko, the governor of Leningrad Oblast, stated on Telegram that the “night and morning of January 4 were record-breaking in terms of the number of UAVs destroyed,” with four shot down over his region.
Andrii Kovalenko, a Ukrainian security official, stated that a seaport in Leningrad was targeted, describing it as a “instrument of economic and military survival for Russia in isolation.”
Meanwhile, Russia launched 81 drones at Ukraine overnight Friday and Saturday, according to Ukraine’s Air Force Command, including Iranian-made Shahed drones and “various types of imitation drones.”
According to a statement, 34 Shahed attack UAVs and other types of drones were downed, causing damage in the Chernihiv and Sumy regions.
Ukraine begins the year on the back foot in the conflict, which began in February 2022, with Russian forces making gains on the eastern frontlines.
The Russian defense ministry announced on Saturday that its forces had taken control of the village of Nadiya in Ukraine’s eastern Luhansk region. Pokrovsk, Donetsk’s hub, is under increasing Russian pressure as Ukrainian forces lose ground to the town’s south and east.
Ukraine is also concerned that the incoming Trump administration will cut critical military aid; Trump has pledged to end the conflict.
