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U.S. and U.K. say Iran supplying Russia with ballistic missiles for Ukraine war in “significant escalation”
London — The United States and Britain formally accused Iran on Tuesday of supplying short-range ballistic missiles to Russia to use in Moscow’s ongoing war in Ukraine, and the allies both said they would take measures to punish those involved. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, speaking alongside British Foreign Secretary David Lammy during a visit to London, said sanctions would be announced later Tuesday.
“Russia has now received shipments of these ballistic missiles and will likely use them within weeks in Ukraine, against Ukrainians,” Blinken said. “The supply of Iranian missiles enables Russia to use more of its arsenal for targets that are further from the front line.”
“For its part, Russia is sharing technology that Iran seeks — this is a two way street — including on nuclear issues, as well as some space information,” Blinken said, adding that among the new sanctions coming from the U.S. would be additional measures targeting Iran Air, the Islamic Republic’s flagship carrier.
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Britain’s government quickly announced its own new wave of sanctions, including seven new designations under its existing sanctions regime against Iran and three new measures against Russia.
Blinken and Lammy also said they were set to pay a joint visit to Ukraine on Wednesday, where they’ll meet President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and other senior officials to discuss bolstering the country’s defenses amid increasingly urgent requests from Kyiv for more and longer-range firepower — and for permission to use American weapons to hit targets deep inside Russian territory.
The Kremlin is trying to repel Ukraine’s surprise offensive, which has seen Zelenskyy’s forces claim hundreds of square miles of territory in Russia’s Kursk region. But Russia has also been on the offensive, with its forces continuing to take ground along the long front line that stretches some 600 miles through Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region.
The accusations about Iranian missiles could embolden Zelenskyy to further ramp up pressure on the U.S. and other allies to allow Ukraine to use Western-supplied missiles to strike deep within Russian territory and to hit sites from which Moscow launches its relentless aerial attacks. President Biden has allowed Ukraine to fire U.S.-provided missiles across the border into Russia in self-defense, but largely limited the distance over concerns about further escalating the conflict.
That hasn’t stopped Ukraine from using its own weapons to hit targets deeper in Russia, including a massive wave of explosive drones launched Tuesday at multiple regions including Moscow.
U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, in his opening remarks at a Ukrainian security conference last week in Germany attended by Zelenskyy, declared it “a critical moment” in the war ignited by Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion.
As CBS News national security correspondent Charlie D’Agata reported, the meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group at the Ramstein Air Base came just days after Zelenskyy’s nation suffered its single worst attack of the year, when two ballistic missiles slammed into a military academy, killing dozens of people and wounding more than 170 others.
Lammy called the Iranian missile transfers to Russia “a troubling pattern that we’re seeing. It is definitely a significant escalation.”
Iran has denied providing Russia with weapons for its war in Ukraine.
“Iran considers the provision of military assistance to the parties engaged in the conflict — which leads to increased human casualties, destruction of infrastructure, and a distancing from cease-fire negotiations — to be inhumane,” according to a recent statement from Iran’s mission to the United Nations.
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Word of the alleged transfers began to emerge over the weekend, with reports that U.S. intelligence indicated they were underway, according to people familiar with the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity. The U.S. and its allies have been warning Iran for months not to transfer ballistic missiles to Russia.
CIA Director William Burns, who was in London on Saturday for a joint appearance with his British intelligence counterpart, warned of the growing and “troubling” defense relationship involving Russia, China, Iran and North Korea, which he said threatens both Ukraine and Western allies in the Middle East.
The White House has repeatedly declassified and publicized intelligence findings that show North Korea has sent ammunition and missiles to Russia to use against Ukraine, while Iran also supplies Moscow with attack drones and has assisted the Kremlin with building a drone-manufacturing factory.
China has held back from providing Russia with weaponry, but it has surged sales to Russia of machine tools, microelectronics and other technology that Moscow in turn is using to produce missiles, tanks, aircraft and other weaponry, according to U.S. officials. It has also continued purchasing significant quantities of Russian energy products, helping to fund Moscow’s war efforts.
Mr. Biden is set to host British Prime Minister Keir Starmer for talks at the White House on Friday, with support for Ukraine’s defense on the agenda.
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TRENTON, N.J. — Democratic Newark City Council President LaMonica McIver has defeated Republican small businessman Carmen Bucco in a contest in New Jersey’s 10th Congressional District that opened up because of the death of Rep. Donald Payne Jr. in April.
McIver will serve out the remainder of Payne’s term, which ends in January. She and Bucco will face a rematch on the November ballot for the full term.
McIver said in a statement Wednesday that she stands on the “shoulders of giants,” naming Payne as chief among them.
She cast ahead to the November election, saying the right to make reproductive health choices was on the ballot as well as whether the economy should benefit the wealthy or “hard working Americans.”
“I will fight because the purpose of politics and the purpose of our vote is to give the people of our communities and our nation a bold voice,” she said.
Bucco congratulated McIver on the victory in a statement but said he’s looking forward to the rematch in November.
“I am not going anywhere,” he said in an email. “We still have a second chance to make district 10 great again!”
Who are LaMonica McIver and Carmen Bucco?
McIver emerged as the Democratic candidate in a crowded field in the July special election. A member of the city council of New Jersey’s biggest city since 2018, she also worked for Montclair Public Schools as a personnel director and plans to focus on affordability, infrastructure, abortion rights and “protecting our democracy,” she told The Associated Press earlier this summer.
Bucco describes himself on his campaign website as a small-business owner influenced by his upbringing in the foster system. He lists support for law enforcement and ending corruption as top issues.
The 10th District lies in a heavily Democratic and majority-Black region of northern New Jersey. Republicans are outnumbered by more than 6 to 1.
It’s been a volatile year for Democrats in New Jersey, where the party dominates state government and the congressional delegation.
Among the developments were the conviction on federal bribery charges of U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez, who has denied the charges, and the demise of the so-called county party line — a system in which local political leaders give their preferred candidates favorable position on the primary ballot.
Democratic Rep. Andy Kim, who’s running for Menendez’s seat, and other Democrats brought a federal lawsuit challenging the practice as part of his campaign to oust Menendez, who has resigned since his conviction.
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Sean “Diddy” Combs at same Brooklyn detention center that held R. Kelly, Sam Bankman-Fried, other high-profile inmates
A second judge refused to grant bail to Sean “Diddy” Combs on Wednesday and he could remain in federal custody at a Brooklyn detention center until his trial for sex trafficking charges. Combs joins other high-profile inmates, such as singer R. Kelly, fallen cryptocurrency mogul Sam Bankman-Fried, rapper Ja Rule —even Al Sharpton served a brief stint— who were held at the same federal detention center.
Notorious for its horrible conditions —inmates won a $10 million class action settlement after enduring frigid conditions during an 8-day blackout in 2019— the waterfront industrial complex, MDC Brooklyn, houses 1,200 inmates.
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Violence and corruption have long plagued the facility; U.S. District Judge Gary R. Brown of the Eastern District of New York wrote the detention center had “dangerous, barbaric conditions” in a recent sentencing opinion. Two inmates were stabbed to death in recent months and several correction officers have been convicted for smuggling contraband and accepting bribes.
Combs joins a list of high-profile personalities that have landed at the MDC Brooklyn, partly because the city’s other federal detention center, MDC New York, closed in 2021, also due to horrible conditions. The disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein died by suicide in his cell there in 2019. “Numerous and serious” instances of misconduct among corrections staff gave Epstein the opportunity to kill himself, a subsequent federal watchdog investigation found.
Kelly sued the federal detention center in 2022 for wrongly putting him on suicide watch after his sentencing. Kelly sought $100 million because he said the detention center knew he wasn’t suicidal after he was convicted in 2021 for racketeering and violating the Mann Act, which bars transporting people across state lines for prostitution.
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Former crypto billionaire Bankman-Fried survived on bread, water and sometimes peanut butter when he was in the MDC Brooklyn, his attorney said, because the detention center continued to serve him a “flesh diet” despite requests for vegan dishes.
Ja Rule stayed at the MDC Brooklyn for a brief time before being released after serving most of his two-year sentence for illegal gun possession. Most of his prison time was spent in a state prison in New York.
Sharpton served a 90-day sentence in 2001 and went on a hunger strike for protesting the U.S. Navy bombing of the island of Vieques, in Puerto Rico.
Combs was taken into custody on Monday and according to an indictment unsealed Tuesday he was charged with sex trafficking, racketeering conspiracy and transportation to engage in prostitution.
His attorney Marc Agnifilo told CBS News, “It’s impossible to prepare for a trial from where he is,” after a first federal judge denied Combs bail on Tuesday.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Robyn Tarnofsky agreed with prosecutors who argued the hip-hop mogul, who is accused of using his business empire as a criminal enterprise to conceal his alleged abuse of women, is a flight risk and poses an ongoing threat to the safety of the community.
Agnifilo said the part of the detention center where Combs is being held is “a very difficult place to be.”
contributed to this report.
