{"id":6151,"date":"2026-06-04T11:31:06","date_gmt":"2026-06-04T11:31:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.johnwhittingdale.org.uk\/?p=6151"},"modified":"2026-06-05T13:04:35","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T13:04:35","slug":"russian-attacks-on-ukraine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.johnwhittingdale.org.uk\/?p=6151","title":{"rendered":"Russian Attacks on Ukraine"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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In this House of Commons exchange, Sir John Whittingdale raises concerns about Russia\u2019s escalating attacks on civilian targets in Ukraine and the growing threat posed by missile and drone strikes. He questions the Government on strengthening Ukraine\u2019s air defences, securing accountability for alleged war crimes, funding future reconstruction and increasing pressure on Russia. The debate highlights his ongoing support for Ukraine and his efforts pressing the government to respond to the humanitarian and security consequences of the conflict.<\/p>

Watch the video below to see his questions:<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t

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Debate Highlights Transcript<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t
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John Whittingdale Conservative, Maldon (Urgent Question):<\/strong><\/p>

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs if she will make a statement on the recent deliberate attacks by Russia on civilian infrastructure, including residential apartment buildings and other non-military targets.<\/p>

Seema Malhotra Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities), Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)<\/strong><\/p>

I thank the right hon. Member for his urgent question. Once again, we are witnessing truly reckless attacks from the Russian state, not only impacting the people of Ukraine, who continue to stand up to these barbaric assaults time and again, but in Romania; a Russian drone hit a residential building there on Friday, injuring civilians. This incident represents a dangerous violation of Romania\u2019s sovereignty and a serious violation of NATO airspace, and it heightens the risk of miscalculation. We stand in full solidarity with Ukraine and Romania, and with all those impacted by Russia\u2019s actions.
Russia is now launching an average of over 5,000 drones a month at Ukraine, more than five times the 2024 average. Last month alone, Russia fired over 7,100 drones \u2014a new record\u2014giving rise to the highest civilian casualty count since April 2022. We condemn this clear escalation by Russia, and it is why yesterday we summoned the Russian ambassador to the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, where we condemned Russia\u2019s escalation, the assaults on Ukraine, and the violation of Romania\u2019s sovereignty. But Ukraine continues to hold firm, and we and our partners and allies stand united with them.
The UK\u2019s total military, economic and humanitarian support for Ukraine amounts to \u00a321.8 billion, and that includes \u00a313 billion in military support. Last month, my right hon. Friend the Defence Secretary announced that the UK will provide the biggest ever drone support for Ukraine, delivering at least 120,000 drones this year. As he said at the Dispatch Box on Monday, he has directed that UK delivery of air defence systems to Ukraine be accelerated. Later this month, he will chair the next meeting of the 50-nation-strong Ukraine Defence Contact Group at NATO headquarters, and will look to further step up the military aid that we and partners can provide to Ukraine together.
Russia can end this war, but in the meantime, we will continue to work with international partners. The Prime Minister spoke with President Zelensky last night. We will continue to ensure that Ukraine gets the military and financial support it needs to defend itself, while ramping up the economic pressure on Russia to force Putin to de-escalate the war and engage in meaningful talks.<\/p>

John Whittingdale Conservative, Maldon<\/strong><\/p>

I thank the Minister for her reply. She will be aware that on Tuesday night, one of the largest aerial attacks so far during this war took place against Kyiv and other cities. It left 22 dead, including two children, and 130 injured. In Dnipro, there was the use of cluster munitions and, indeed, a so-called double-tap attack against one of the civilian protection units. Ukraine has developed some of the best technology in the world against the use of drones, but Russia is stepping up its use of ballistic missiles and cruise missiles. Can she say what the Government will do to try to boost Ukraine\u2019s air defences, particularly through the supply of Patriot anti-missile defences? Can she confirm that records are being kept of the attacks carried out by Russia that constitute war crimes, and that Russia will be held to account for them, through the establishment of a special tribunal to prosecute Russia for the crime of aggression? Can she confirm that Russia will be made to pay for reconstruction of the damage, through the use of frozen assets? Finally, will she now look at formally designating Russia a terrorist state?<\/p>

Seema Malhotra Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities), Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)<\/strong><\/p>

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his remarks. It is absolutely clear that the strikes that hit Ukrainian cities, killed civilians and injured hundreds of people are utterly unacceptable. That underscores the fact that Russia is not serious about peace. It must end its illegal war. Some of the questions that he asked are on matters that he continues to discuss with the relevant Minister, but I want to say this: it is extremely important that we continue to maintain international pressure on Russia. He will have heard me talk about the announcement that the Defence Secretary has made. We continue to work with our international allies to ensure military support for Ukraine\u2019s efforts. We are keeping up our sanctions effort, which he knows we have strengthened to ensure that we hold Russia to account, from every angle, for what it is doing. We are seeking to end the war, and to ensure that we have meaningful dialogue.\u201d<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sir John condemns Russia\u2019s attacks on Ukrainian civilians, and presses the government for stronger air defences, accountability for war crimes, reconstruction funding and consideration of designating Russia a terrorist state.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6184,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[97,96,98],"class_list":["post-6151","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-speeches","tag-russia","tag-ukraine","tag-ukrainewar"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.johnwhittingdale.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6151","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.johnwhittingdale.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.johnwhittingdale.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.johnwhittingdale.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.johnwhittingdale.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6151"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.johnwhittingdale.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6151\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6183,"href":"https:\/\/www.johnwhittingdale.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6151\/revisions\/6183"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.johnwhittingdale.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6184"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.johnwhittingdale.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6151"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.johnwhittingdale.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6151"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.johnwhittingdale.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6151"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}