Rishi Sunak mentioned the destruction of the Kakhovka dam in Ukraine would mark a “new low” within the battle if Russian forces had been discovered to be accountable.

The Prime Minister mentioned the instant precedence was the humanitarian response to the disaster, which has flooded villages, endangered important crops and threatened consuming water provides.

Mr Sunak, chatting with reporters as he travelled to Washington for talks with US President Joe Biden, mentioned if it was an intentional act to explode the dam it will be “the largest attack on civilian infrastructure” because the begin of Vladimir Putin’s battle.

He mentioned that assaults on civilian infrastructure had been “appalling and wrong”.

Kyiv accused Russian forces of blowing up the dam and hydroelectric energy station in an space that Moscow has managed for greater than a 12 months, whereas Russia blamed Ukrainian bombardment within the contested space.

READ MORE: Urgent evacuation begins of thousands of people after Ukraine dam explosion

Asked concerning the conflicting reviews over who's accountable for the dam destruction, Mr Sunak mentioned: "Our military and intelligence agencies are currently looking at it. It is too soon to pre-empt that and make a definitive judgement.

"But what I can not say is that if it is intentional, it will characterize, I believe, the biggest assault on civilian infrastructure in Ukraine because the begin of the battle, and simply show the brand new lows that we'd have seen from Russian aggression. Attacks on civilian infrastructure are appalling and unsuitable. We've have seen earlier situations of that on this battle up to now, however it's too early to say definitively."

He added: "Of course I'll be discussing Ukraine with President Biden, typically, however the instant response is humanitarian. So we had already put assets and funding in place to assist each the UN and the Red Cross to answer conditions like this. And they're now having the ability to divert these assets to significantly assist the humanitarian response and the evacuation on this space because of what's occurred. So we had been already pondering forward about conditions like this, and I'm happy that the UK is constant to assist Ukraine in a lot of alternative ways."

Officials have described the breach as an “ecological disaster”, while Ukrainian authorities have ordered hundreds of thousands of residents downriver to evacuate.

Foreign Secretary James Cleverly described it as an “abhorrent act”, adding that “intentionally attacking exclusively civilian infrastructure is a war crime”.

There are concerns that the damage to the dam could have broad consequences: flooded homes, streets and businesses downstream; depleted water levels upstream that help cool Europe’s largest nuclear power station; and drained supplies of drinking water to the south in Crimea, which Russia illegally annexed.

The deputy head of the Office of the President of Ukraine mentioned the “ecocide” was “really terrible”.

Igor Zhovkva advised BBC Radio 4’s World At One programme Russia’s claims that shelling had caused the damage were “absurd,” saying: “I know that there was a blast and it was made on purpose because you cannot ruin this dam (only) by shelling.”

But Evgeny Popov, a member of the Duma for Vladimir Putin’s United Russia social gathering, claimed Ukraine would “profit” from the injury and mentioned Russia is evacuating 22,000 folks from the world.

He accused Ukraine of a “war crime” by finishing up the assault.

“We don’t need to do that. We are not attacking civilian infrastructure,” he advised the identical programme.