Ukraine yet to receive U.S. permission to strike deep into Russia – Zelensky

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said this in an interview with CNN journalist Fareed Zakaria, Ukrinform reports.

"Everyone is looking at the decisions of the United States. Everyone is waiting for such decisions. After that, they make such decisions, it's true. And that is why we really wanted to use these weapons to attack these [Russian] jets at military bases, not civilian infrastructure," Zelensky said. 

At the same time, he confirmed that Ukraine simply wants to be able to attack bases that Russia is using to bomb Ukrainian territory.

"They use these jets to launch not only missiles. They drop 4,000 guided aerial bombs every month in the east of our territory alone, 4,000 bombs. And these bombs and missiles hit the Ukrainian civilian population, schools, energy. These guided bombs destroyed 80% of our energy infrastructure," Zelensky said.

At the same time, the head of state noted that during meetings with partners, he had already informed them that they had waited too long.

"Now Moscow has started moving its jets from bases that were 100 or 150 kilometers away to 300-500 kilometers. After that, I will tell you that now we need more permissions," he said.

When asked whether Ukraine currently has permission for deep strikes into Russia, the president said: "No."

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said earlier that President Joe Biden did not rule out allowing Ukraine to use Western-made missiles for deep strikes into Russia.

A group of Republicans from the House of Representatives in a letter to Biden called on him to lift restrictions on Ukraine's use of long-range weapons provided by Washington for deep strikes into Russia.