Ukraine-Russia war latest: Biden allows Zelensky to conduct long-range missile strikes inside Russia

Russian lawmaker Maria Butina said on Monday that the administration of president Joe Biden was risking World War Three if it had allowed Ukraine to use US-made weapons to strike deep into Russia.

“These guys, Biden’s administration, is trying to escalate the situation to the maximum while they still have power and are still in office,” Ms Butina told Reuters.

“I have a great hope that (Donald) Trump will overcome this decision if this has been made because they are seriously risking the start of World War Three which is not in anybody’s interest.”

Reuters, citing two US officials and a source familiar with the decision, reported on Sunday that Biden’s administration has made the decision to allow Ukraine to make the strikes with US weapons deep into Russia.

In a secret factory in central Russia, engineers are manufacturing hundreds of decoy drones meant to overwhelm Ukrainian defences as they try to protect against a horrific new weapon.

The plant in Russia’s Alabuga Special Economic Zone recently started churning out thermobaric drones alongside the decoys, an Associated Press investigation has found.

The thermobaric warheads create a vortex of high pressure and heat that can penetrate thick walls. They suck out all the oxygen in their path, and have a fearsome reputation because of the injuries inflicted even outside the initial blast site: Collapsed lungs, crushed eyeballs, brain damage.

Read this joint report from my colleagues Emma Burrows, Hanna Arhirova, Lori Hinnant:

Sir Keir Starmer has said “we need to double down” on support for Ukraine as it was reported Joe Biden has given the green light to Kyiv to use US-supplied long-range missiles to strike inside Russia.

The prime minister pledged that Ukraine was “top” of his agenda at this week’s G20 summit of world leaders and told reporters that “there’s got to be full support as long as it takes”.

There has been concern about the level of support the US may continue to give Ukraine when president-elect Donald Trump returns to the White House in January.

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German chancellor Olaf Scholz has said his call with Putin was necessary to ensure Europe remained a key player following Donald Trump’s election.

In their first direct communication in nearly two years, Scholz told Putin that he “cannot count on support from Germany, Europe and many others in the world waning”.

But Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky said it was a breach of Western solidarity in favour of domestic political advantage.

Following Russia’s huge missile attack on Ukraine overnight on Sunday, Ukrainian foreign minister Andrii Sybiha took a dig at Scholz, saying the attack was Putin’s “true response to all those who called and visited him recently”.

Scholz added of the call: “The conversation was very detailed but contributed to a recognition that little has changed in the Russian President’s views of the war - and that’s not good news.”

But Donald Trump’s re-election, and his promise of a quick end to the war, has implications for Europe, Scholz said.

“In my view it would not be a good idea if there were talks between the American and Russian presidents and the leader of an important European country was not also doing so,” he said.

The United States will allow Ukraine to use US-made weapons such as Atacms rockets, which have a range of up to 306km, to strike deep into Russia, two US officials and a source familiar with the decision said on Sunday.

The reversal of policy, nearly 1,000 days since Russia started its full-scale invasion on Ukraine, comes largely in response to Russia’s deployment of North Korean troops to supplement its forces, a development that has caused alarm in Washington and Kyiv, a US official and a source familiar with the decision told Reuters.

There was no immediate response from the Kremlin, but some Russian senior lawmakers said loosening of the limits on Ukraine’s use of US weapons is a major escalation.

President Vladimir Putin said in September that the step would mean “direct involvement of Nato countries” in the war.

Russia’s defence ministry has announced the destruction of 59 Ukrainian drones in a series of overnight incidents, including two directed towards Moscow. Most of the drones—45 in total—were intercepted over the Bryansk region, which shares a border with Ukraine, according to a ministry statement on Telegram.

Additional drones were reportedly brought down in the Kursk, Belgorod, and Tula regions, alongside the two targeting the Moscow area. Moscow’s mayor, Sergei Sobyanin, confirmed on Telegram that preliminary assessments showed no casualties or damage where debris fell.

In the Bryansk region, governor Alexander Bogomaz stated that all drones targeting the area had been successfully intercepted.

Ukraine has yet to respond to these claims. While Reuters could not independently verify the reports, Kyiv has previously justified drone operations inside Russia as efforts to disrupt infrastructure supporting Moscow’s war campaign.

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky has said Ukraine is defending itself against “absolute evil”, as he shares footage of the devastation following what Kyiv says is Russia’s largest missile attack in months.

“Russian terrorists are once again trying to intimidate us with cold and blackouts, repeating their actions and trying to get results from them,” Mr Zelensky said in a post on X.

“The entire world sees and knows that we are defending ourselves against absolute evil, which understands no language but force. We need unity, the world needs unity. Only together can we stop this evil.”

Russia used nearly 140 missiles of different types, 900 guided aerial bombs and over 600 strike drones, Mr Zelensky added.

“Efforts to address the consequences of the combined attack on our infrastructure in the Rivne, Lviv, Dnipropetrovsk, Volyn, and Odesa regions are ongoing.”

A late-night attack devastated a residential block and left the city without power, officials confirm.

A Russian missile strike on a residential building in the northeastern Ukrainian city of Sumy has killed 10 people, including two children, and injured 55 others, local authorities reported. Among the injured were eight children, according to a statement by the Sumy city council shared on Telegram.

The attack, which struck a nine-storey apartment block late on Sunday, left the city’s administrative centre without power after a separate missile hit critical infrastructure. Photographs shared by Ukraine’s State Emergency Service showed widespread devastation, with cars engulfed in flames, rescuers assisting survivors, and a building with shattered windows and a heavily damaged facade.

“Sunday evening for the city of Sumy became hell, a tragedy that Russia brought to our land,” said Volodymyr Artyukh, head of the Sumy military administration, in a statement. Emergency responders continued rescue efforts at the scene, with over 400 people evacuated from the affected area. Psychologists were also on-site to provide support to survivors.

The State Emergency Service of Ukraine described the scene as a massive operation, with photographs showing firefighters battling flames and rescuers navigating the wreckage to carry survivors to safety.

There has been no response from Moscow regarding the strike. Reports from local prosecutors and emergency services have corroborated the details, with Reuters verifying the location through imagery analysis.

Joe Biden has sensationally granted Kyiv permission to use “long-range “ missiles to strike targets deep within Russia, despite Vladimir Putin describing such a move as an act of war.

The weapons are likely to be used in response to North Korea’s decision to send thousands of troops to Russia in support of President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and comes after months of pressure from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky

He argued the US ban had made it impossible for Ukraine to try to stop Russian attacks on its cities and electrical grids.

My colleague Barney Davis looks closer at the weapons that could mark a turning point in the war: