President Vladimir Putin said Russia would use cluster bombs if they’re used against his troops, while denying - despite evidence - that Kremlin forces have already used the controversial munitions in Ukraine.
“Russia has enough of various types of cluster munitions, of various kinds,” Putin said in an interview with the Russia-1 TV channel, part of which was posted on the Telegram channel by reporter Pavel Zarubin.
“Until now, we have not done this, we have not used it, and we have not had such a need,” Putin added. “But, of course, if they are used against us, we reserve the right for mirror actions.”
Monitors from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe concluded last year that Kremlin forces had used cluster bombs during its invasion of Ukraine, which helped create “unnecessary and disproportionate harm to civilians.”
“Russia’s forces have employed cluster munitions and used explosive weapons such as air-dropped bombs, missiles, heavy artillery shells, and multiple launch rockets in populated areas,” the US ambassador to the Vienna-based OSCE said in July 2022.
Putin, in the Russia-1 interview, also referenced a “well-known shortage of ammunition that we had as well, during a certain period of time” - a rare admission by the Kremlin leader of problems with the Russian military effort.
The US announced this month it would provide cluster munitions to Ukraine, several months after Kyiv requested the weapons. The bombs have started to arrive in Ukraine, the Pentagon said on Thursday.
Over 100 countries, including several NATO members and key allies to Ukraine, are signatories to a treaty that aims to ban the use and transfer of the weapons. Russia, the US and Ukraine are not signatories.
Read more: All About the Cluster Bombs Biden Is Sending Ukraine
Cluster munitions are bombs that open in the air and release tens or hundreds of smaller “bomblets” that can spread over an area as wide as several football fields. Unexploded bomblets can pose a danger to civilians even years later.
Ukraine’s defense secretary said the weapons “will significantly help us to de-occupy our territories while saving the lives of the Ukrainian soldiers.”
Russia “has been indiscriminately using cluster munitions from day one of its invasion,” Oleksii Resnikov said in a July 7 Twitter post that laid out Kyiv’s rationale for needing the weapons. Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city “was relentlessly bombarded” by the munitions in February and March of 2022,” he said.
Commenting on the US decision to supply the weapons to Ukraine, Putin noted that the use of such type of munitions was at one point called a crime by the US. He suggested that the move was provoked by a shortage of ammunition in general.
A NATO official said last week that cluster bombs will reduce the need for Ukraine to expend other artillery, which is in short supply. The munitions, especially the reliable US version, are effective in targeting airfields but also military personnel in trenches, the official told journalists in Vilnius at the alliance’s summit.
--With assistance from Alberto Nardelli and Daryna Krasnolutska.