A government minister has declined to say if the UK was involved in a Ukrainian drone strike after the Russian ambassador partially blamed Britain for the attack.
More than a hundred drones were used to attack sites inside Russia over the weekend, leading to more than 40 warplanes being destroyed.
Speaking to The World With Yalda Hakim on Sky News following the attack, Russia’s UK ambassador warned it could risk escalating the conflict to “World War III”.
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Andrei Kelin pointed the finger at the UK because of the nature of the strike.
“[This] kind of attack involves, of course, provision of very high technology, so-called geospaced data, which only can be done by those who have it in possession. And this is London and Washington,” he told Hakim.
“I don’t believe that America [is involved], that has been denied by President Trump, definitely, but it has not been denied by London.
“We perfectly know how much London is involved, how deeply British forces are involved in working together with Ukraine.”
Asked if the UK had provided Ukraine with this technology, Steve Reed, the environment secretary, told Sky News: “I’m not going to speculate on something when I don’t know what the facts were.”
He said that “we as a government, cross-party actually, are standing foursquare alongside Ukraine as they fight – try to defend themselves – against a brutal, unprovoked and illegal attack and invasion”.
Mr Reed added: “We want there to be peace talks. We want this conflict to end. But it’s quite right that we should support Ukraine.”
Challenged if this escalation could risk Britain getting sucked into the conflict with Russia more directly, the cabinet minister responded: “I do know that the people of this country and the government of this country, want to stand alongside Ukraine.
“We need peace to happen in that region, we can’t allow Russia to get away with invading any more countries.”
It comes at a time of escalating tensions in the region, with both Russia and Ukraine upping their attacks. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said his country’s drone strikes at the weekend “will undoubtedly be in history books”.
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Sir Ed Davey has said supports the government’s actions “to back President Zelensky”, but said he would like to see them go further.
The party leader said on Friday: “Liberal Democrats would like the government to give even more support to Ukraine.
“We would like to see the Russian assets that have been frozen in the UK confiscated so we have the resources to support Ukraine even more.”
Sir Ed said people in the UK “want us to be backing Ukraine with finance and with armaments” and his calls for the government to go further extend to military support, too.
Asked if this might put the UK at risk of walking into a wider conflict, Sir Ed dismissed this, saying he doesn’t “believe that risk is there”.
“I think the Russians will no doubt try to threaten in their way that they’ve done year after year, but they always back down”, he added.
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The Lib Dem leader said the Russian ambassador’s comment did not surprise him and that Russian officials “just lie every time”.
The blow is seen as one of the most daring of the war so far, though the US estimated only around 10 Russian bombers were blown up – and Russia said none were.
Overnight, Russia claimed it downed 174 Ukrainian drones and three cruise missiles across the country.
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Meanwhile, Ukrainian authorities said Russia attacked towns and cities across Ukraine overnight.
Mr Zelenskyy said the assault was formed of more than 400 drones and 40 missiles.
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US President Donald Trump had urged Mr Putin not to retaliate on Thursday. He told reporters: “I don’t like it, I said don’t do it, you shouldn’t do it, you should stop it.”
In response to the allegations of British involvement, a Downing Street spokesperson said: “We never comment on operational matters at home or abroad.”
