Ukraine claimed a pair of attacks on oil depots in western Russia, the latest salvo in Kyiv’s air campaign against strategic targets on Russian soil almost three years into the war.
Kyiv’s General Staff said its forces had struck storage facilities overnight in the Kaluga and Tula regions. Damages were still being assessed, it said in statements on each attack, adding that the depots supported Moscow’s war effort in Ukraine.
Kaluga’s regional governor, Vladislav Shapsha, said on Telegram that a fire had broken out after an industrial site was hit in the city of Lyudinovo.
He later said seven drones had been downed, with one landing in a “non-residential area”.
Tula’s regional governor, Dmitry Milyaev, said on social media that a fuel and lubricant tank had caught fire at a facility in the region as result of a Ukrainian drone attack.
Ukrainian forces have stepped up strikes inside Russia, primarily oil depots and military production facilities, as they struggle to hold back steady Russian advances on the battlefield in eastern Ukraine.
Russia has also carried out regular air strikes on Ukrainian towns and cities, killing four people on Saturday in a missile attack on central Kyiv.
Both sides in Russia’s almost three-year-old invasion of Ukraine have sought to improve their positions ahead of Monday’s inauguration of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, who has said he would seek a swift end to the war.
According to a report by Ukrinform, Ukraine’s national news agency, the Ukrainian Security Service, in coordination with the Ukrainian Navy, carried out a strike earlier this month on a drone hangar in Russia’s Rostov region near the Ukrainian border. The targeted warehouse reportedly exploded due to stored ammunition inside.
Ukrinform further reported that Ukrainian forces launched additional drone strikes on industrial facilities in Russia’s Rostov and Leningrad regions earlier the same day. The strikes allegedly caused fires at two industrial enterprises, adding to the escalating tensions between the two nations.
Team Bharatshakti
(With inputs from Reuters)
