Deadly attack a reminder of what Ukraine needspublished at 16:05 British Summer Time
Frank Gardner
Security correspondent
The attack on
Poltava, with its exceptionally high death toll, is a further reminder of
Ukraine’s dire need for more and better air defences.
President Zelensky has
also used this incident to repeat his call to his Western allies for help in
hitting those bases inside Russia from which attacks are being launched.
The
question of whether Western donors should now remove the restraints on their
long-range weapon systems being used inside Russia was the hot topic at last
weekend’s Globsec24 security forum in Prague.
There were calls from several
Western ministers and military experts for Ukraine to be given free rein to
target bases deep inside Russia.
But Washington and Berlin are known to be
reluctant to agree to this, for fear of escalation and prompting a Russian
retaliation against a Nato country – a caution that many say is unjustified.
But
the attack on Poltava is believed to have been launched from Russian-occupied
Crimea, where Ukraine already has the green light to hit targets, as Crimea is
not considered Russian territory by most of the international community.
Of
greater concern right now to Ukraine is the lack of warning it was able to give
its citizens as these high-speed ballistic missiles came hurtling down.