EU’s Top Diplomat Calls for Supporting Long-Range Strikes in Russia

Zelensky is pushing hard for the US and other NATO countries to lift restrictions on the use of Western-provided missiles

Josep Borrell, the EU’s top diplomat, called on Wednesday for Western countries that are providing weapons to Ukraine to lift restrictions to allow long-range strikes inside Russia with NATO weapons.

The US is allowing Ukraine to use US-provided weapons in its Kursk offensive but is not permitting them to be used in long-range strikes. “Ukraine’s Kursk offensive is a severe blow to Russian President Putin’s narrative,” Borrell wrote on X.

“Lifting restrictions on the use of capabilities vs the Russian military involved in aggression against Ukraine, in accordance with international law, would have several important effects,” he said.

Borrell claimed allowing long-range strikes would help peace efforts, but Russia is ruling out any negotiations with Ukraine in the wake of the Kursk offensive, which was launched on August 6.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is pushing hard for the US and NATO to lift all restrictions on the use of their weapons, and has called his Western backers’ concerns about escalation “naive.” In the meantime, Ukraine has been stepping up longer-range attacks inside Russia using drones.

“Our Ukrainian drones work exactly as they should,” Zelensky said last week. “But there are things that cannot be done with drones alone. Unfortunately. We need other weapons—missile weapons.”

While Zelensky is downplaying the risk of a major Russian response, the US-backed invasion of Russian territory and the use of NATO weapons inside the Russian mainland marks a huge escalation of Russian territory.

Author: Dave DeCamp

Dave DeCamp is the news editor of Antiwar.com, follow him on Twitter @decampdave.