Moscow: Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday warned that its navy is ready to carry out an “unpreventable strike” on enemy targets if it was in the country’s “national interests.”
Putin was speaking in Saint Petersburg during a parade of warships, just a few weeks after the UK angered Russia by sending a British warship close to the annexed Crimea peninsula.
“We are capable of detecting any underwater, above-water, airborne enemy and, if required, carry out an unpreventable strike against it,” he said.
His remarks follow an incident in the Black Sea in June when Russia said it had fired warning shots and dropped bombs in the path of a British warship to chase it out of Crimea waters.
Putin said last month Russia could have sunk the British warship HMS Defender, that it accused of illegally entering its territorial waters, without starting World War Three and said the United States played a role in the “provocation.”
The Russian leader added that Russia had secured its place among the world’s leading naval powers, including by developing “the latest hypersonic precision weapons still unrivaled in the world.”