Russia has conducted the combat training launch of a mobile, solid-fuel Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM), firing it from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome to a test range in the country’s Far East, the Russian defence ministry said.

An ICBM is a long-range missile capable of travelling between continents and, in Russia’s arsenal, can carry nuclear warheads.

The missile was launched on Friday from the northwestern Arkhangelsk region and travelled more than 6,700 kilometres to the Kura training ground on the Kamchatka Peninsula, the defence ministry said.

The Strategic Missile Forces first moved a mobile missile-launching unit to a remote location before preparing and conducting the launch. Footage released by the military showed the missile rising from a forested area.

The ministry said the exercise was intended to verify the missile system’s “tactical, technical and flight characteristics”. It said all assigned objectives had been completed and the missile followed a “flawless trajectory”.

While Russian authorities did not identify the missile used in Friday’s launch, the test came against a backdrop of heightened tensions between Moscow and the West, following an intensification of long-range drone and missile attacks involving Russia and Ukraine.

It also followed reports that CIA Director John Ratcliffe made a previously undisclosed visit to Moscow earlier this week.

The visit was intended to warn Russia against attacking NATO, multiple foreign media outlets claimed.

US President Donald Trump described Ratcliffe’s meetings with Russian intelligence officials as “semi-routine” and said he hoped the visit could contribute to efforts to end the Russia-Ukraine war.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Ratcliffe had not met President Vladimir Putin, adding that contacts had taken place through intelligence services.

Russia’s Strategic Missile Forces operate the country’s land-based ICBMs and form a central part of its nuclear deterrent. In May, Russia said it had carried out a Yars ICBM launch from Plesetsk towards the Kura range during missile-force exercises that also involved Belarus.

Friday’s launch also came less than a week after unverified reports that Ukrainian drones had targeted Plesetsk, Russia’s only military spaceport.