Moscow, Russia:
President Vladimir Putin said Monday that Moscow will intensify attacks on military targets in Ukraine after an unprecedented attack on the Russian city of Belgorod this weekend.
The attack killed 24 people and injured more than 100 in Belgorod on Saturday. It came after Moscow launched a large-scale attack on Ukrainian cities.
“We are going to intensify the attacks, no crime against civilians will go unpunished, that much is certain,” Putin said on Monday during a visit to a military hospital.
He said Russia will continue to attack what he called “military installations.”
“We do that today, and we will continue to do that tomorrow,” Putin said, almost two years after the Moscow offensive.
He spoke as Ukraine said Russia had hit the country with a “record” number of drones on New Year's Day.
Putin called the attack on Belgorod a “terrorist attack” and accused Ukrainian forces of targeting “right in the city center, where people were walking, before New Year's Eve.”
He repeated the claim that Ukraine is being used by the West to solve “its problems” with Russia.
The Russian leader said he believed the “strategic initiative” in the ongoing conflict lay on the Russian side.
“In any case, this is how I am informed and I always insist: all offensive operations must be carried out after the defeat of the enemy,” he said, according to the Interfax news agency.
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