On Friday, the U.S. Department of Defense announced new military assistance for Ukraine that includes dual-purpose enhanced conventional munitions, also known as cluster bombs, Sputnik news agency noted.

“This is a new step towards escalated situation in Ukraine. Our response will be too harsh,” Karasin said.

Likewise, Karasin hoped the international community “to assess the increasingly alarming situation in Ukraine and raise serious doubts about its course given the unilateral and totally irrational decisions made by Washington and NATO member states.”

Russian Senator Sergey Tsekov, on the other hand, warned that using cluster munitions could lead to mass death of civilians, “and let us hope that our armed forces to eliminate the cluster munitions before it is too late.”

The Convention on Cluster Munitions, adopted in 2008, is the only binding international treaty banning the use of cluster weapons.

So far over 100 countries have joined this treaty, but the United States, Russia, China, India, Iran, Pakistan, Turkey, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the Republic of Korea and Ukraine are not yet party to it.

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