Outgoing US President Joe Biden has authorised Kyiv to use the long-range weapons against Russia.
Russia has pledged to retaliate after it claimed to have shot down eight US-supplied ATACMS missiles fired by Ukraine at its border region of Belgorod.
“On January 3, an attempt was made from Ukrainian territory to launch a missile attack against the Belgorod region using US-made ATACMS operational-tactical missiles,” the Russian Ministry of Defence said on Saturday.
“These actions by the Kyiv regime, which is supported by Western curators, will be met with retaliation,” it added, saying all the missiles were shot down.
The ministry said earlier that air defences downed eight ATACMS missiles in total, without saying when or where.
Officials in Ukraine have not yet responded to the accusation.
The Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) has a range of 300km (190 miles) and was first developed in the 1980s.
Outgoing US President Joe Biden had authorised Kyiv to use long-range weapons against Russia last year, in a move the Kremlin denounced as a grave escalation of the nearly three-year conflict. Biden is expected to announce additional security assistance for Ukraine in the coming days, according to White House spokesperson John Kirby.
US President-elect Donald Trump said in an interview last month he was “very vehemently” opposed to Ukraine using the arms, which he said were “escalating” the conflict.
Besides military support from the US, Kyiv will also reportedly receive its first French Mirage 2000-5F multirole fighters this month, according to French magazine Avions Legendaires.
Russian President Vladimir Putin threatened last year to strike central Kyiv with a hypersonic ballistic missile if Ukraine continued hitting Russian territory with long-range Western weapons.
Both Kyiv and Moscow have accused each other of fatal attacks on civilians since the year began.
A Russian attack on a village in Ukraine’s northeast Kharkiv region earlier on Saturday killed a 74-year-old man, regional Governor Oleg Synegubov said.
At least three people, including two children, were wounded in a Russian attack on the Sumy region of northeastern Ukraine on Saturday, local authorities said. Sumy borders Russia’s Kursk region and has been regularly shelled by Russian forces for months.
Russian forces also launched attacks near the Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk in an effort to bypass it from the south and cut off supply routes to Ukraine’s troops, the Ukrainian military said on Saturday.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy noted that Russia had launched 300 attack drones and 20 missiles at Ukrainian targets in the first three days of 2025, but said a large amount was shot down by Kyiv’s forces.
“Such Russian terror, which continues with unrelenting intensity, requires both us and all our partners not to reduce efforts in strengthening our air defence shield and all its systemic components – from Patriot systems to mobile fire groups,” Zelenskyy said on his social media platforms.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will embark on his final trip in office this weekend, travelling to South Korea, Japan, and France.
At meetings in Paris, he is expected to discuss European security and Russia’s war in Ukraine with French officials, showcasing the Biden administration’s final outreach towards Kyiv before the Trump government takes over.
