A law enforcement officer stands guard in a street in Sevastopol, Crimea
Credit: Reuters File Photo
Moscow: Russia said on Sunday that the United States was responsible for a Ukrainian attack on the Russian-annexed Crimean peninsula with five US-supplied missiles that killed at least five people including three children and injured 124 more.
The Russian Defence Ministry said four of the US-delivered Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) missiles, equipped with cluster warheads, were shot down by air defence systems and the ammunition of a fifth had detonated in mid-air.
The ministry said US specialists had set the missiles' flight coordinates on the basis of information from US spy satellites, meaning Washington was directly responsible.
"Responsibility for the deliberate missile attack on the civilians of Sevastopol is borne above all by Washington, which supplied these weapons to Ukraine, and by the Kyiv regime, from whose territory this strike was carried out," the ministry said.
The United States began supplying Ukraine with longer range ATACMS missiles, which have a 300-km range, earlier this year.
Reuters was unable to immediately verify battlefield reports from either side.
Television footage on Russian state television showed people running from a beach and some people being carried off on sun loungers.