A village in Belgorod Region was targeted with the controversial weapon, Vyacheslav Gladkov says
FILE PHOTO: US-made cluster munitions. © AFP / DVIDS
Ukraine has targeted a village in Russia’s Belgorod Region with cluster munitions, governor Vyacheslav Gladkov has said.
At least three cluster munitions were employed by the Kiev forces during a large-scale attack on the settlement of Zhuravlevka, Gladkov wrote on Telegram on Saturday.
According to the governor, 21 artillery shells and ten mortar rounds were also fired at the village. It was also targeted with a single kamikaze drone.
There were no casualties or damage in Zhuravlevka as a result of the shelling, he said.
Smaller artillery, mortar and drone attacks targeted at least a dozen other settlements in Belgorod Region on the same day, Gladkov wrote.
In the village of Ilek-Penkovka, 12 households were affected by an explosion, with the facades of buildings being damaged and windows shattered, he said, adding that injuries had been avoided.
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The US announced the delivery of cluster munitions to Ukraine earlier this month, with President Joe Biden describing it as a stopgap measure that was necessary due to a shortage of regular artillery rounds among Kiev’s Western backers.
The controversial shells, which contain multiple bomblets that are dispersed over a large area, have been banned in more than 100 countries. However, neither Ukraine, the US, nor Russia are signatories of the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions (CCM).
Washington admitted that it was aware of the increased risk posed by cluster munitions for the civilian population, but claimed that Kiev had pledged to deploy them responsibly and steer clear of densely populated areas.
On Thursday, White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby confirmed that the Ukrainian forces had begun using US-supplied cluster munitions on the battlefield. They were doing so “quite effectively,” he claimed.
Russian President Vladimir Putin noted last week that the US itself had earlier branded the use of cluster munitions “a crime,” saying this was exactly how he regarded the delivery of such weapons to Kiev by Washington.
READ MORE: White House rejects cluster bomb criticism
The Russian military has a “sufficient” stock of cluster munitions, which it can also put to use in a tit-for-tat response to such weapons being deployed by Ukraine, the president warned.
