US President Joe Biden has disputed Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s assertions that a missile that landed in Poland and killed two people was not of Ukrainian origin.
Ukraine’s president said on Wednesday he had “no doubt” the missile “was not Ukrainian” and called for his officials to have access to the site of the blast.
Mr Biden has said the trajectory suggested the missile was unlikely to have come from Russia and, when asked on Thursday about Mr Zelenskyy’s comments on the issue, he told reporters: “That’s not the evidence.”
The missile hit a grain silo on a farm in Przewodow – around four miles from Poland’s border with Ukraine – on Tuesday.
The blast sparked an international outcry amid the possibility it represented a Russian assault on NATO territory, after the Polish ministry of foreign affairs described the missile as “Russian-made”.
However, Moscow insists it did not fire the missile, with Russia’s defence ministry denying Russian involvement, saying: “No strikes on targets near the Ukrainian-Polish state border were made by Russian means of destruction.”
Three US officials have said preliminary assessments suggest the missile was fired by Ukrainian forces at an incoming Russian one.
Ukraine maintains stocks of Soviet and Russian-made weaponry, including air-defence missiles, and has also seized many more Russian weapons while beating back the Kremlin’s forces during the conflict – now in its ninth month.
