Ukraine has received the first F-16 supersonic multi-role fighter jets it has sought for months to counter Russian missile attacks, a US official confirmed to US media.

Kiev has been asking its Western allies for months for F-16 jets, claiming they are needed to shoot down missiles fired from Russia at Ukrainian territory.

F-16s specialize in suppressing enemy air defenses. The West was reluctant to supply Kiev with these planes, fearing that arming Ukraine with advanced weapons would further escalate the war with Russia.

The US is also training Ukrainian pilots to fly the F-16. The first group of pilots has successfully completed the training.

At the NATO summit in Washington in July, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy pressed the allies to remove all restrictions on the use of weapons that Kiev received from the West and above all to allow Ukraine to use those weapons to attack more targets in Russia.

For now, it is not known how many F-16 aircraft arrived in Ukraine in the first tranche, nor which countries provided them.

The Ukrainian government has not yet confirmed that it has received the planes.

US President Joseph Biden approved sending US fighter jets to Ukraine in August 2023, following months of pressure from Kiev and internal debate within the US administration, whose officials feared the move could escalate tensions with Russia.

Four NATO members – Belgium, Denmark, the Netherlands and Norway – have pledged to provide Ukraine with more than 60 aircraft. That number is smaller than Russia's battle fleet, which is estimated to be about 10 times larger.