Ukraine claims that Russia uses dud nuclear-capable missiles against it
KYIV: Ukraine’s military has said Russia is using nuclear-capable missiles with unexploded warheads to destroy Ukraine’s air defenses, the Ukrainian military said.
He showed what he said were fragments of a Soviet-made X-55 cruise missile – designed for nuclear use – found in two western Ukraine regions. The rockets are being imported to “destroy our country’s air defense system,” a Ukrainian official said.
According to BBC, he said that tests done on the fragments did not show much radioactivity. Experts in the Ukrainian military say Russia may have destroyed a large arsenal of its weapons after a wave of attacks on Ukraine’s critical infrastructure in recent weeks.
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They say that now Moscow is starting to work without reason, which is still causing chaos. A British intelligence report in November came to a similar conclusion.
Russia – which launched a full-scale attack on Ukraine on February 24 – has yet to comment publicly on the issue. During a press conference Thursday in Ukraine’s capital Kyiv, military official Mykola Danyliuk showed reporters what he described as fragments of an X-55 anti-aircraft missile (known to NATO as AS-15) in the Lviv and Khmelnytsky regions.
He said these were designed during the Soviet era to undermine “pre-determined plans and arrangements.” The UK said the missile was intended “solely as a nuclear delivery system.”
However, it is believed that the Russian military removed nuclear warheads from the battlefields of Ukraine and replaced them with inert systems. Mr. Danyliuk emphasized that even a weapon with a non-explosive warhead “poses a great danger” because of its high energy and fuel consumption.
“This was demonstrated by the last strike when an X-55 missile hit a residential building.”
The tests showed “no contact [of the missile] with nuclear material,” he added. On Thursday, an air alert was put in place across Ukraine – except for the Russian-annexed southern region of Crimea – after reports said Russian warplanes might be preparing to carry out another missile attack. The input is also disabled.
