Putin sends in a warship over ‘illegal act’

VLADIMIR Putin yesterday denounced the US missile strikes as an illegal act of aggression against a sovereign nation.

Moscow said the bombardment violated international law, had been ordered on a trumped-up pretext and had inflicted substantial damage on US-Russia relations.

The furious Russian president responded to the attack against his ally by diverting warship the Admiral Grigorovich to protect the Syrian coast and vowing to bolster tyrant Bashar al Assad’s missile defences against further bombing raids.

He also suspended a military hotline known as the ‘deconfliction line’ which is designed to avoid mid-air collisions and confrontations between Russian and US fighter jets over the war-torn country.

Mr Putin acted as fears grew that the crisis could topple into war between Russia and the West.

His spokesman Dmitry Peskov said: ‘This move by Washington is causing substantial damage to Russian-US relations.

‘Mr Putin believes that this step does not bring us closer to the ultimate goal in the fight against international terrorism. On the contrary, it creates serious obstacles to efforts to forge an international coalition to fight against it and effectively counter this global evil.’

Russia’s foreign minister Sergey Lavrov strongly condemned the US strike.

He said: ‘This is an act of aggression under a far-fetched pretext. Russia will draw conclusions from the actions of the United States in Syria.’

The Kremlin’s propaganda machine clicked into gear, claiming only 23 of 59 cruise missiles reached the Shayrat airbase, destroying six Syrian jets but leaving the runway intact. It said no Russian servicemen were killed or injured. The Pentagon insisted that all but one of the missiles hit their targets and Russia had been given a 30-minute warning of the strike to minimise casualties.

A convoy of Russian vehicles was seen leaving the airbase on Thursday night.

Russia warned that hopes of a new dawn in relations between the US and Russia, which had seemed high after Donald Trump’s election victory, had been dealt a major blow.

Pentagon officials last night urged the Kremlin to keep military communication channels open.