Latest Ukraine war: Russia threatens Europe with ‘problems’ if Kiev gets Tomahawks

Russia will create “problems” for Europe if Donald Trump allows Tomahawk missiles to be sent to Ukraine, a senior Russian official has said.

Andrei Kartapolov, head of the Russian parliament’s defense committee, suggested that Moscow would retaliate against any country supplying missiles to Ukraine.

He said, “We know these missiles very well, how they fly, how to shoot them down; we have worked with them in Syria, so there is nothing new in this. The only problem will be for those who supply them and those who use them; that is where the problems will lie.”

“Our response will be tough, unambiguous, measured and asymmetric. We will find ways to hurt those who harass us,” said Kartapolov, head of the Russian parliament’s defense committee.

Kartapolov, a former deputy defense minister, said he did not think Tomahawks would change anything on the battlefield even if they were supplied to Ukraine, as he said they could only be delivered in small numbers – in the tens rather than hundreds.

Russia’s deputy foreign minister also warned against allowing Washington to send Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine, calling it a potential “qualitative” change in US involvement in the war.

Russia carried out a series of “large-scale” drone and guided bomb attacks in the Sumy region yesterday evening, killing at least three people and wounding two, the regional governor said.

Governor Oleh Hryhorov said the casualties included a 40-year-old man in Mykolaivka, a 65-year-old man in Velika Pisarivka and a 66-year-old man in Bilopyliya.

He said the series of attacks targeted rural communities in the region and caused serious damage to civilian infrastructure.

The Ukrainian city of Shostka, located in the northeastern Sumy region, was hit hard by the Russian attack on its power grid, officials say.

Authorities there have provided tents where locals can warm up, drink hot tea, charge their phones and receive psychological support, Hryhorov said.

He posted photos on Telegram on Tuesday of people cooking in outdoor kitchens on the street over open fires.

A Russian nighttime drone strike in Ukraine’s southern region of Odessa injured five people and damaged port and energy infrastructure, its governor said this morning.

Oleh Kipar said on Telegram that the attack cut power to 30,000 consumers and set fire to containers containing vegetable oil and wood pellets in the port.

Governor Andrei Bocharov said this morning that a fire broke out at fuel and energy facilities in Russia’s Volgograd region as a result of a drone strike.

He said that firefighters are currently extinguishing the fire.

Ukraine has stepped up its drone attacks on Russian oil infrastructure ahead of the winter months in a bid to damage Moscow’s ability to finance the war.

Russia’s Defense Ministry said air defense systems intercepted and destroyed 19 Ukrainian drones over Russian territories overnight, including nine in the Volgograd region.

The Kremlin is trying to influence the US decision about sending Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine through its European partners, according to a leading think-tank tracking the war.

The Institute for the Study of War said, “Kremlin officials continued to claim that U.S. personnel would directly participate in Ukrainian Tomahawk strikes and that the missiles would not affect Russia’s determination to achieve its war goals or the battlefield situation.”

Senior Russian officials said yesterday that Moscow would create “problems” for Europe if Donald Trump allows Tomahawk missiles to be sent to Ukraine.

Andrei Kartapolov, head of the Russian parliament’s defense committee, suggested that Moscow would retaliate against any country supplying missiles to Ukraine.

He said, “We know these missiles very well, how they fly, how to shoot them down; we have worked with them in Syria, so there is nothing new in this. The only problem will be for those who supply them and those who use them; that is where the problems will lie.”

Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkana said the supply of US-made Tomahawk cruise missiles to Ukraine would help “push back Russia”.

“What we can give to Ukraine without any sanctions is helping it win the war and push back Russia,” Tsakhna said.

“So, if President Trump and the US are deciding to lift the sanctions even with military support [as] Tomahawks, it’s just helping Ukraine conquer and push Russia back,” he told ABC.

“It is up to the United States to decide,” Tsahkana said. He said approval of the supply of these missiles would send a “very strong message” to Russia.

Russian President Vladimir Putin arrived in Tajikistan yesterday to take part in meetings with leaders of other ex-Soviet republics focusing on regional development and their relations with Moscow.

A Kremlin announcement said Putin will attend the Russia-Central Asia summit starting today, which will also be attended by the leaders of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

He will then join the leaders of Armenia, Azerbaijan and Belarus at a meeting of the broader Commonwealth of Independent States, bringing together the former Soviet republics.

Putin has been forced to limit his travel abroad in recent years due to an order for his arrest issued by the International Criminal Court over the deportation of Ukrainian children during the Ukrainian War.

Russian strikes killed three people in and around the city of Kherson in Ukraine’s south, the regional governor said.

Oleksandr Prokudin said two people were killed in the attack in the Kherson district yesterday morning. A third died when Russian forces shelled the Bilozerka area outside the city.

Ukrainian troops recaptured Kherson and parts of the region of the same name in late 2022, but Russian forces still hold large parts of the region.

Volodymyr Zelensky said Ukrainian forces were inflicting heavy losses in the counteroffensive in the eastern Donetsk region, contrary to Vladimir Putin’s claims that Russia was taking the initiative in the region.

Speaking in his nightly video address, Zelensky said he spoke to top commander Oleksandr Syrsky for about an hour, “paying special attention to the Dobroplyya operation, our counter-offensive”.

He described extensive damage in the area. Ukraine has pointed to successes in Dobropylia, just north of the logistics hub of Pokrovsk, one of the key targets of Russia’s slow advance westward through the Donetsk region.

Ukrainian forces are “protecting themselves in all directions,” Zelensky said, specifically referring to Kupyansk, a largely destroyed city in northeastern Ukraine that came under heavy Russian attacks for months.

He also described the conditions around Novopavlivka in the far south of the Zaporizhia region as “difficult”, but said that “our active defensive actions there are showing good results”.

The region has been the main theater of the war in Ukraine for more than three and a half years.