Edited by: Saim Dušan Inayatullah and Wesley Dockery
Ukrainian drone attacks have killed nine people and wounded over 60 more across Russia say officials in Moscow, with Kyiv’s strikes targeting logistics centers and sparking a fire at an oil depot.
Kyiv has intensified its long-range drone campaign against Russian energy, military and logistics infrastructure in an effort to weaken Moscow’s ability to sustain its invasion.
Seven night-shift workers were killed and 25 people were injured when drones struck a warehouse operated by Russia’s largest online retailer, Wildberries, in Kotovsk in the Tambov region, Governor Yevgeny Pervyshov said on Saturday.
“Seven people working the night shift died at the scene,” Pervyshov wrote on Telegram. The town is some 360 kilometers (roughly 220 miles) from the border with Ukraine.
He said Russian air defenses had also shot down 28 drones approaching the region and claimed the number of casualties could have been substantially higher.
A second Wildberries warehouse was hit in Elektrostal, around 50 kilometers east of Moscow, injuring 37 people, according to Moscow regional Governor Andrei Vorobyov. One of those wounded in the strike later died from injuries sustained in the attack.
Russian online news outlets on Saturday released video of massive plumes of smoke at the Elektrostal facility.
Burning debris from the strike also ignited blazes at a maternity hospital and a nearby residential building said Vorobyov, who reported that both fires had been extinguished.
Wildberries co-founder and CEO Tatyana Kim described it as a “terrible night” for Russia and the company, often described as the Russian equivalent of Amazon. She offered her condolences to the victims’ families.
In nearby Noginsk, falling drone debris ignited a fire at an oil depot and injured two people, Vorobyov said.
Authorities evacuated a nearby maternity hospital and a residential building as a precaution. Officials did not immediately provide details of the damage to the oil facility.
A drone also struck a residential building in Vladimir, around 180 kilometers east of Moscow, briefly setting it on fire. Regional Governor Alexander Avdeyev said no one was injured.
A ninth person was reportedly killed and another injured in Russia’s Belgorod region on Saturday afternoon.
ignited a fire at an oil depot
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said long-range strikes had hit two “significant logistics facilities.”
Zelenskyy said the strikes had been carried out “in response to Russian strikes on our civilian infrastructure and on our cities and communities.”
“These facilities were used by the aggressor to supply sanctioned components for the production of drones and navigation equipment,” he wrote on Telegram.
The Ukrainian president also said Ukrainian forces had carried out operations against targets in the Sea of Azov and Russian-occupied territory.
Ukraine’s military on Saturday reported hitting Russian oil tankers, floating cranes and a tugboat in the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov, as well as a patrol vessel in Kerch and a railway bridge in the Russian-occupied Luhansk region.
The head of Ukraine’s drone forces said Saturday’s attacks bring the number of Russian vessels struck in the Black and Azov seas in recent weeks to 172, claiming that the efforts had forced Moscow to redeploy frontline troops to maritime positions to protect ships from attack.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said air defense systems intercepted 379 Ukrainian drones overnight across 19 regions, as well as over annexed Crimea, the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea. It made no comment on troop redeployments.
Fresh Russian Attack On Ukraine’s Odesa Region
Meanwhile, a Russian attack has struck port infrastructure in Ukraine’s southern Odesa region, killing one person and damaging a foreign-flagged vessel.
The ship, which was sailing under the flag of Antigua and Barbuda, was hit during Saturday’s attack, regional Governor Oleh Kiper said on Telegram. Three other people were injured.
The strike also damaged port buildings, storage tanks and warehouses, Kiper said.
Disclaimer: This report first appeared on Deutsche Welle, and has been republished on ABP Live as part of a special arrangement. Apart from the headline, no changes have been made in the report by ABP Live.
