British Storm Shadow missiles have been used by Volodymyr Zelensky to strike an important chemical plant that produces gunpowder in southern Russia.
The use of missiles supplied by Britain in Russia’s Bryansk region will likely spark condemnation from Vladimir Putin’s government.
‘A massive combined missile and air strike was carried out, including the use of air-launched Storm Shadow missiles, which successfully penetrated the Russian air defense system,’ Ukraine’s General Staff said in a statement on X on Tuesday.
‘This enterprise produces gunpowder, explosives, and components for rocket fuel, in particular for ammunition and missiles that the enemy uses to shell the territory of Ukraine,’ the military said.
The British government last year approved the use of Storm Shadow missiles by Ukrainian forces in operations on Russian territory, with the first known strikes happening in November.
Ukraine’s general staff described the plant asa ‘key facility’ producing gunpowder, explosives and rocket fuel and said damage caused by the operation was being assessed.
Images on social media claim to show flames billowing out of the facility.
The Ukrainian air force, army and other units carried the attack.
British Storm Shadow missiles have been used by Volodymyr Zelensky to strike a gunpowder plant in Russia
Images on social media claim to show flames billowing out of the facility
The military said the outcome of the strike was being assessed.
Storm Shadow missiles have a range of between 155-349 miles and are equipped with advanced navigation systems to strike critical targets.
Ukraine has previously used Storm Shadows to hit targets in Russia’s Bryansk and Kursk, as well as in Russian-occupied Crimea.
The latest strike comes on the same day that President Zelensky said that Ukrainian long-range attacks on Russia ‘may hold the indispensable key to peace.’
It also comes after US President Donald Trump’s plan for a swift meeting with Russian leader Vladimir Putin was put on hold.
The meeting was announced last week and was supposed to take place in Budapest, Hungary, in the near future.
However, the idea was paused after a call between U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, according to the official, who wasn’t authorised to speak publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
The decision to hold off on a meeting between Trump and Putin will likely relieve European leaders, who have accused Putin of stalling for time with diplomacy while trying to gain ground on the battlefield.
The leaders — including the British prime minister, French president and German chancellor — said they opposed any push to make Ukraine surrender land captured by Russian forces in return for peace, as Trump has occasionally suggested.
They also plan to push forward with plans to use billions of dollars in frozen Russian assets to help fund Ukraine’s war efforts, despite some misgivings about the legality and consequences of such a step.
Trump has not yet commented publicly about the change in plans for his meeting with Putin.
They previously met in Alaska in August, but the encounter did not advance Trump’s stalled attempts to end a war that began almost four years ago.
The Kremlin didn’t seem to be in a rush to get Trump and Putin together again either. Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Tuesday that ‘preparation is needed, serious preparation’ before a meeting.
Zelensky has been trying to strengthen Ukraine’s position by seeking long-range Tomahawk missiles from the US, although Trump has waffled on whether he would provide them.
‘We need to end this war, and only pressure will lead to peace,’ Zelenskyy said Tuesday in a Telegram post.
He noted that Putin returned to diplomacy and called Trump last week when it looked like Tomahawk missiles were a possibility.
But ‘as soon as the pressure eased a little, the Russians began to try to drop diplomacy, postpone the dialogue,’ Zelensky said.
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