Moscow says first Ukrainian attack on Russia with US-made missiles signals west wants to escalate conflict – Russia-Ukraine war live | Ukraine

Reuters has a quick snap that the White House National Security Council spokesperson has said Washington is not surprised by the Russian announcement of an updated nuclear doctrine.

They continued by saying that the US saw no reason to change its own nuclear doctrine or posture in response to the statements from Russia today.

Sergey Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, speaking in Rio de Janeiro, has said the use of US-made Atacms in a Ukrainian attack on Bryansk was “a signal” that the west wants to escalate the conflict.

Tass reports him saying “without the Americans, it is impossible to use these high-tech missiles. Putin has spoken about this several times.”

In September Russia’s president had said that the use of the weapons on targets inside Russia would amount to “the direct involvement of Nato countries, the US and European countries in the war in Ukraine.”

In a slight dampening down of the rhetoric today around nuclear weapons, Lavrov said Russia is strictly committed to a position of avoiding nuclear war, and that the weapons act as a deterrent.

He suggested that nothing in the updated nuclear doctrine published by Russia today differs from anything in US doctrinal documents, which also include broad terms such as permitting the US use of nuclear weapons to “stop potentially overwhelming conventional enemy forces”, ensure the success of an operation, or to end a war on terms favourable to the US.

Senior US and Ukrainian officials have confirmed that US-made Atacms missiles have been fired into Russian territory for the first time during the Ukraine war.

The attack came two days after Joe Biden’s administration permitted their use, and on the 1,000th day of the war since Russia’s full-scale invasions was launched.

The senior officials confirmed the early morning launches to the New York Times.

Russia’s ministry of defence claimed it had shot down five of six missiles fired at Bryansk, in an attack with took place at 3.20am Moscow time (0.20am GMT).

Russia today announced that it had lowered its threshold for what could potentially trigger the use of its nuclear weapons, including considering it a joint attack if it consisted of “aggression by any non-nuclear state, but with the participation or support of a nuclear country.”

The UK’s foreign secretary, David Lammy, has reaffirmed the British government’s support for Ukraine on the 1,000th day of the war.

Speaking in the House of Commons, Lammy said he is urging European countries who are not spending 2% of their GDP on defence to do so.

Speaking to the shadow foreign secretary, Priti Patel, Lammy said: “Successive US governments – long before Donald Trump – has been raising that as an issue. And, of course, it is our intention to get back to 2.5% of GDP. That is what it was when we left office and we want to get back there.”

Lammy says Britain has committed £7.8bn to military support and that the prime minister, Keir Starmer, has committed to provide £3bn a year in military support for “as long as it takes”.

He expressed “huge concerns” about Pyongyang’s deployment of troops in Moscow’s war with Ukraine, describing it as a “major escalation” in the conflict. According to US, South Korean and Ukrainian intelligence assessments, up to 12,000 North Korean troops have been sent to Russia as part of a major defence treaty between the countries. You can hear more of Lammy’s comments in this video:

The death toll from a Russian drone attack on the small town of Hlukhiv in Sumy region has risen to at least 12 (previous reports said 7 people had been killed).

The strike by a Shahed drone in the northern Sumy region late on Monday (11.20pm local time) reportedly hit a dormitory of an educational facility in Hlukhiv.

Authorities said 12 people, including a child, were killed and 11 others, including two children, were injured. More people are likely trapped under the rubble.

As well as speaking to the European parliament to mark 1,000 days since Russia invaded Ukraine, president Volodymyr Zelenskyy also addressed Ukraine’s Verkhovna Rada on Tuesday.

Reuters is carrying these quotes from the speech, where Zelenskyy told the Ukrainian people that “In the decisive moments – and they will come next year – we should not allow anyone in the world to doubt Ukraine’s resilience.”

He continued:

At this stage of the war, it is being decided who will prevail. Whether us over the enemy, or the enemy over us Ukrainians … and Europeans. And everyone in the world who wants to live freely and not be subject to a dictator.

We have achieved the highest level of closeness with the EU and Nato since our independence. All necessary architecture for the negotiation process with the EU has been formed. Ukraine’s right to Nato membership is vitally important for all of us.

Recently mooted peace proposals, including one by Turkey’s president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, have suggested that Ukraine make concessions on territory or that the frontline of the conflict could be frozen as is. Zelenskyy rejected this kind of talk, telling Ukraine’s parliament:

We will not trade our sovereignty, security or the future of Ukraine. We will not give up Ukraine’s rights to its territory. And we will not abandon a rational approach to guarantee the rights of our state. We should act wisely. Maybe Ukraine will have to outlive someone in Moscow in order to achieve all its goals.

The foreign ministers of Germany, France, Poland, Italy, Spain and the UK have issued a joint declaration of support for Ukraine after several of them met in Warsaw.

In it, the six ministers say:

Russia is systematically attacking European security architecture.

Russia’s reckless revisionism and constant refusal to stop the aggression and engage in meaningful talks challenges peace, freedom and prosperity on the European continent and in the transatlantic area.

Russia is increasingly reliant on partners such as Iran and North Korea in order to sustain its illegal warfare.

Moscow’s escalating hybrid activities against Nato and EU countries are also unprecedented in their variety and scale, creating significant security risks.

Pledging support for Ukraine, the statement adds that the six countries will:

• reaffirm the enduring role of a strong and united Nato as a bedrock of European defence and security

• strengthen Nato by stepping up security and defence expenditure

• strengthen Europe’s security and defence, using all levers available, including the economic and financing power of the EU and by reinforcing Europe’s industrial base

• invest in critical military capabilities

• enhance resilience to cognitive warfare and hybrid threats in Europe

• further step up military, economic and financial support for Ukraine

UK prime minister Keir Starmer’s official spokesperson has described president Vladimir Putin’s regime as a “depraved Russian government” after the Russian president signed a new nuclear doctrine for the Russian Federation on Tuesday.

In the doctrine, Russia says it will treat “aggression by any non-nuclear state, but with the participation or support of a nuclear country” as an attack that could merit a nuclear response. [See 8.45 GMT]

The Downing Street spokesperson, who traditionally remains anonymous but speaks on the record on behalf of the prime minister, said:

It would be fair to say it’s the latest example of irresponsibility that we’ve seen from the depraved Russian government.

We remain steadfast in our support for Ukraine and the defence of an illegal invasion, and we’ve always said that the defence of the UK starts in Ukraine.

We’re very clear that Vladimir Putin could end this war tomorrow. He could remove his troops, roll back his tanks and end the onslaught and needless bloodshed in both Ukraine and Russia. That is entirely within his gift. We would urge him to do so.

Putin ordered changes to the nuclear doctrine in the weeks leading up to the US election.

On Tuesday morning Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said the use of western non-nuclear missiles by the Ukrainian armed forces against the Russian Federation under the new doctrine could lead to a nuclear response, urging that the new nuclear doctrine should become the subject of deep analysis abroad.

Peskov said updating the doctrine was needed to bring the document into line with the current political situation. [See 8.54 GMT]

In effect it lowers the threshold for what might merit a nuclear attack from Russia, including factors such as “a critical threat to [the Russian Federation’s] sovereignty, even with conventional weapons”, an attack on Belarus, or “the event of a massive launch of military aircraft, cruise missiles, drones, other aircraft and their crossing the Russian border.”

Russia has claimed that debris from a US-made Atacms missile has landed in the Bryansk region.

Russia’s state-owned news agency Tass, citing Russia’s ministry of defence, has reported that the debris fell on a military facility in the Bryansk region. It said there was a small fire.

The ministry said it had shot down five of the missiles over the Bryansk region. The attack resulted in no casualties or damage, it said.

The claims have not been independently verified. Ukraine has not commented on the Russian reports, and there has been no confirmation from US or other allied powers.

The Joe Biden administration had given Ukraine long sought after permission to use the longer-range missiles at targets in the neighbouring Kursk region, where Ukrainian forces have staged an incursion and where Russia has deployed allied North Korean troops.

Overnight Ukrainian forces claimed to have successfully targeted a Russian logistics centre near the city of Karachev in Russia’s Bryansk region, causing multiple explosions.

If Russia does not stop committing acts of sabotage in Europe, Warsaw will close the rest of its consulates in Poland, Polish foreign minister Radosław Sikorski said on Tuesday.

“I have closed the consulate in Poznań. If they do not stop, we will close the rest,” Reuters reports he told a news conference.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy received two standing ovations from MEPs, as he spoke to mark 1,000 days of Russia’s full-scale war on Ukraine.

But not all MEPs were there. The 25 MEPs who make up the far-right Europe of Sovereign Nations group were absent because they had scheduled an “external group meeting” a spokesperson said.

The group’s largest continent is Germany’s Alternative für Deutschland party, which wants to end military aid for Ukraine and whose senior leaders have spoken approvingly of Russian president Vladimir Putin.

Jennifer Rankin is the Guardian’s Brussels correspondent. Here is her report on Ukraine’s president addressing the European parliament:

Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said his country could face 100,000 North Korean troops, as he urged European nations to intensify their military aid and appeared to make a dig at Olaf Scholz.

Speaking by video link to the European parliament, Zelenskyy said Putin had brought 11,000 North Korean troops to Ukraine’s borders and “this contingent may grow to 100,000”.

Zelenskyy did not elaborate further, but his remarks appear to endorse a Bloomberg report citing unnamed sources saying that North Korea could deploy 100,000 troops to assist Russia against Ukraine.

The short speech marked 1,000 days since Russia’s full-scale invasion and was intended as a rallying call to EU nations. Zelenskyy told lawmakers that even with North Korea Russian president Vladimir Putin remained smaller than “the united states of Europe”.

Zelenskyy also appeared to make a dig at the German chancellor Olaf Scholz, who recently triggered snap elections, and has long frustrated Kyiv with Germany’s slow pace of military support and its refusal to supply German-made long-range Taurus missiles.

“While some European leaders think about some elections or something like this … Putin is focused on winning this war. He will not stop on his own. The more time he has, the worse the conditions become,” Zelenskyy said.

Ukraine’s president appeared to make a veiled appeal for long-range weapons, saying that without “certain key factors, Russia will lack real motivation to engage in meaningful negotiations”. Zelenskyy enumerated those factors as fires in ammunition depots on Russian territory, disrupting military logistics and destroying Russian airbases.

In the lame duck days of his presidency Joe Biden has allowed Ukraine to use US-made long-range missiles, but Scholz continues to rule that out and is not expected to change his mind.