The White House has effectively admitted to committing war crimes by agreeing to send cluster munitions to Ukraine, according to a statement released Sunday evening by the Russian Embassy in the United States, Reuters reports.

“We closely followed the statements of the spokesman of the National Security Council of the White House, John Kirby, about the supply of cluster munitions to Ukraine. The official de facto admitted the commission of war crimes by the United States in the Ukrainian conflict,” the Russian embassy reported on the Telegram messenger.

Both Russia and Ukraine accuse each other of using cluster munitions in Moscow’s 500-day war against Kyiv. Last week, Ukraine promised that the ammunition that the US decided to deliver to Kyiv would not be used in Russia.

On Friday, the United States announced new military aid to Ukraine against Russia, including cluster munitions, surpassing a new threshold in the type of weapons supplied to Kyiv. Washington’s statement caused sharp criticism from non-governmental organizations and put European countries in an awkward situation.

This highly controversial weapon can disperse up to several hundred small explosive charges and has been blamed for numerous collateral casualties among the civilian population.

They are prohibited in many countries, especially European, signatories of the Oslo Convention of 2008, to which neither the USA, nor Ukraine, nor Russia are parties.