Russia says Ukraine fired U.S.-made ATACMS missiles at Voronezh

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MOSCOW (Reuters) -Russia’s defence ministry said on Wednesday that Ukrainian forces had fired four U.S.-made ATACMS missiles at the southern Russian city of Voronezh in an attempted strike on civilian targets.

Ukraine’s military said on Tuesday it had attacked military targets in Russia with U.S.-supplied ATACMS missiles, calling it a “significant development.”

Kyiv received the systems in 2023 but was initially restricted to using them only on its own territories, nearly a fifth of which are controlled by Russia.

“Russian S-400 air defence crews and Pantsir missile and gun systems shot down all ATACMS missiles,” Russia’s defence ministry said on Telegram.

Falling debris from the destroyed missiles damaged the roofs of a Voronezh retirement home and an orphanage, as well as one house, the ministry said adding that there were no casualties or injured among civilians.

The ministry published pictures of pieces of the missiles and said that air reconnaissance forces identified the Kharkiv region as the location of the ATACMS launch.

Russia said it had fired Iskander-M missiles to destroy two Ukrainian multiple rocket launchers.

Ukraine previously attacked Russian territories with U.S.-made ATACMS missiles on January, firing six missiles on Russia’s Belgorod region.

After Ukraine fired U.S. ATACMS and British Storm Shadow missiles into Russia last year, Putin ordered a hypersonic missile be fired at Ukraine.

(Reporting by Reuters in Moscow and Lidia Kelly in Melbourne; Editing by Tom Hogue)