Ukraine’s air defence stocks dwindling as cross-border strikes on Russia continue

Ukraine said it was facing a shortage of air defence missiles amid heavy rocket and drone attacks by Moscow’s forces, as the Kremlin pledged to “do everything” to halt Ukrainian strikes on border areas that have prompted hundreds of Russians to flee their homes.

“Intense Russian air attacks force us to use a corresponding amount of air defence resources. That is why we need more of them, as Russia keeps increasing its attack capabilities,” Ukrainian air force spokesman Yuriy Ihnat said on Tuesday.

“So it is clear that there is a shortage of anti-aircraft guided missiles ... I think our Western partners are well informed about the state of affairs with our air defence systems,” he told Ukrainian television.

Russia launched several particularly heavy air strikes on Ukrainian towns, cities and infrastructure in recent days, using more than 500 missiles and drones that killed scores of civilians and injured hundreds.

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The attacks caused blackouts in hundreds of communities around Ukraine during the coldest weather of the winter, during which the temperature in much of the country has not climbed above minus 10 degrees.

The onslaught also deepened Ukrainian concern over the flow of military supplies and other aid from Western allies, at a time when tens of billions of dollars and euro in funding are blocked by political disputes in the United States and European Union.

Russian officials said cross-border shelling from Ukraine killed a woman in the Kursk region on Tuesday, and that several Ukrainian drones were shot down in Belgorod province, where areas near the frontier face almost daily artillery and drone strikes.

Hundreds of Belgorod residents have evacuated their homes near the border in recent days and moved to safer parts of the region that are further from Ukraine. Officials said they were also planning to evacuate more than 1,000 children from the area.

Russian officials said two Ukrainian “kamikaze” drones hit an oil facility in the western Oryol region on Tuesday, injuring three people and causing a blaze that was quickly brought under control.

“Of course, our military will continue to do everything in order first to minimise the danger and then eliminate it entirely,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said of cross-border drone strikes and shelling.

Kyiv says its forces are holding their positions along the 1,000km front line in eastern Ukraine, where Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu insisted on Tuesday that his troops were in the ascendancy.

“We retain the strategic initiative along the entire line of contact. We will continue to consistently achieve the goals of the special military operation,” he told senior officers in Moscow, using the Kremlin’s term for its invasion of Ukraine.

Both Ukraine and Russia are looking at ways to boost their military ranks, 22 months into a full-scale war that has killed tens of thousands of soldiers and displaced millions of Ukrainian civilians.

Ukrainian deputies are assessing new draft legislation on conscription, after president Volodymyr Zelenskiy said that military officials had proposed the mobilisation of another 450,000 – 500,000 people.

Russia mobilised 300,000 reservists in September 2022 and has freed tens of thousands of convicts to fight. Undocumented migrants have reportedly been detained and threatened with deportation unless they join the army, and the Kremlin issued a decree last week to expedite Russian citizenship for foreigners who sign up to fight.

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