Britain and Poland will build two temporary villages in western and central Ukraine to provide housing for those forced from their homes by Russia's invasion, London said on Tuesday, pledging 10 million pounds ($12.3 million) in funding.
Almost 118,000 Ukrainians have been hosted by British families as part of the government's response to Russia's February 2022 invasion, but some are finding it increasingly difficult to get permanent housing.
Britain's government said the villages in Lviv in western Ukraine and Poltava in central Ukraine would be able to house more than 700 people, a fraction of the millions either displaced in Ukraine or who have fled the country.
"For the past year, (Russian President Vladimir) Putin has continued to target civilian homes and infrastructure, with the Ukrainian people paying a heavy price," British foreign minister James Cleverly said in a statement.
Putin's allegations against Ukraine and the UK
Putin said his country has hundreds of thousands of depleted uranium shells in response to the United Kingdom's decision to supply such shells to Ukraine, Russian state media outlet Interfax reported on Saturday.
"I must say that Russia, of course, has something to answer. Without exaggeration, we have hundreds of thousands, hundreds of thousands of such shells. We have not used them yet," Putin told Russian TV channel Rossiya-24.
Putin alleged that the uranium shells "generate the so-called radiation dust" and falsely claimed that although they are not weapons of mass destruction, they contain a "nuclear component."
Jerusalem Post Staff contributed to this report.