DUBLIN: Russian officials on Thursday said Ukrainian helicopters had hit residential buildings and injured seven people in the Bryansk region, the latest of a series of cross-border attacks that Moscow has said may trigger a retaliatory attack on Kyiv.
The governor of the Belgorod region said a village there was also attacked, but that no one was injured.
Ukraine’s defense ministry, which has declined to comment on several border incidents including a strike on a fuel depot in the city of Belgorod earlier this month, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on reports of cross-border attacks.
“On April 14, 2022, using two combat helicopters equipped with heavy offensive weapons, military personnel of the Armed Forces of Ukraine illegally entered the airspace of the Russian Federation,” Russia’s investigative committed said in a statement.
“Moving at low altitude, they carried out at least six air strikes on residential buildings in the village of Klimovo,” it said. Six buildings were damaged and seven people were injured, the statement said.
A health ministry official saying two people had been seriously injured, RIA news agency reported.
Bryansk region authorities closed schools for fear of further strikes, TASS news agency reported.
Vehicles were damaged when a border post came under mortar fire from Ukraine near Klimovo on Wednesday, Russia’s FSB security service told state television.
Russia’s defense ministry on Wednesday said the continuation of “sabotage and attacks” by Ukrainian forces could trigger strikes on Kyiv.
“If such incidents continue, then consequence from the armed forces of the Russian Federation will be attacks on decision making centers, including in Kyiv, which the Russian army has refrained from to date,” the defense ministry said.
Authorities in four Russian regions bordering Ukraine and in Russian-controlled Crimea announced they were stepping up security measures on Monday over what they said were “possible provocations” from the Ukrainian side.
Moscow’s incursion into Ukraine, the biggest attack on a European state since 1945, has seen more than 4.6 million people flee abroad, killed or wounded thousands and left Russia increasingly isolated on the world stage.
The Kremlin says it launched a “special military operation” to demilitarise and “denazify” Ukraine. Kyiv and its Western allies reject that as a false pretext for an unprovoked attack.
Russia says Ukraine helicopters strike homes in cross-border attack
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Russia says Ukraine helicopters strike homes in cross-border attack
- The governor of the Belgorod region said a village there was also attacked, but that no one was injured
- Ukraine's defence ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on reports of cross-border attacks
Russia says foreign forces in Ukraine would be ‘legitimate targets’
- Moscow has repeatedly said it will not tolerate the presence in Ukraine of troops from Western countries
MOSCOW: Russia would regard the deployment of any foreign military forces or infrastructure in Ukraine as foreign intervention and treat those forces as legitimate targets, the Foreign Ministry said on Monday, citing Minister Sergei Lavrov.
The ministry’s comment, one of many it said were in response to questions put to Lavrov, also praised US President Donald Trump’s efforts at working for a resolution of the war and said he understood the fundamental reasons behind the conflict.
“The deployment of military units, facilities, warehouses, and other infrastructure of Western countries in Ukraine is unacceptable to us and will be regarded as foreign intervention posing a direct threat to Russia’s security,” the ministry said on its website.
It said Western countries — which have discussed a possible deployment to Ukraine to help secure any peace deal — had to understand “that all foreign military contingents, including German ones, if deployed in Ukraine, will become legitimate targets for the Russian Armed Forces.”
The United States has spearheaded efforts to hold talks aimed at ending the conflict in Ukraine and a second three-sided meeting with Russian and Ukrainian representatives is to take place this week in the United Arab Emirates.
The issue of ceding internationally recognized Ukrainian territory to Russia remains a major stumbling block. Kyiv rejects Russian calls for it to give up all of its Donbas region, including territory Moscow’s forces have not captured.
Moscow has repeatedly said it will not tolerate the presence in Ukraine of troops from Western countries.
The ministry said Moscow valued the “purposeful efforts” of the Trump administration in working toward a resolution and understanding Russia’s long-running concerns about NATO’s eastward expansion and its overtures to Ukraine.
It described Trump as “one of the few Western politicians who not only immediately refused to advance meaningless and destructive preconditions for starting a substantive dialogue with Moscow on the Ukrainian crisis, but also publicly spoke about its root causes.”
