what is the difference between an intercontinental missile and a medium range missile?

The prospect of a Russian intercontinental missile attack on Ukraine is receding. This Thursday, November 21, at the end of the day, a senior American official, in a statement sent to AFP, affirmed that the Russian fire against the city of Dnipro was that of a “medium-range experimental ballistic missile” and not an intercontinental missile, contrary to initial assertions from the Ukrainian air force this morning. This new weapon “will not change the situation in this conflict”specifies Washington which suspects that Russia “probably only has a handful”. Shortly after, Russian President Vladimir Putin himself spoke in an address to the Nation, confirming that it was indeed a question of“a new medium-range missile” what “our engineers called 'Orechnik'”, which did not carry a nuclear charge and which would be “hypersonic”.

Another American source, cited by Reuters, mentions, for its part, a “range missile…