Yuriy Kobzar21:13, 04.06.24

Washington was reminded that Ukraine had already done so during this war.

Ukraine was not limited in its right to shoot down warplanes in Russian airspace that pose a potential threat, in particular, launch guided aerial bombs. White House representative John Kirby said this at a briefing, Ukrinform reports .

“I just want to point out that there is some confusion in this context. There has never been a restriction on Ukrainians shooting down enemy aircraft, even if those aircraft are not necessarily in Ukrainian airspace,” Kirby said.

He emphasized that the Ukrainian army “can shoot down Russian planes that pose an imminent threat.” At the same time, Kirby reminded that the Defense Forces of Ukraine had already done this during the war.

Permission to strike on Russian territory

As UNIAN wrote, at the end of May, the United States and other partner countries relaxed their ban on strikes on Russian territory by Western weapons. This became one of the main consequences of the repeated Russian invasion of the Kharkiv region in May of this year. However, some of the restrictions remain : you cannot strike far into Russia, you cannot use ATACMS missiles.

It is worth adding that shortly before the partial cancellation of the ban on strikes against the Russian Federation, the German publication Bild wrote that the USA and Germany threatened to stop supplying Ukraine with weapons precisely because of the downing of planes in Russian airspace. 

This probably happened after the Armed Forces of Ukraine used the Patriot air defense system to destroy several planes and helicopters in the sky over the Bryansk region last May.

(C)UNIAN 2024