Ukraine struck Russian territory with at least 13 missiles and 84 drones. The attack triggered a fire at an oil refinery in the southern Rostov region in Russia that burned for hours, officials stated.
As Russia advances at the fastest pace since the start of the war in 2022, Ukraine has repeatedly tried to strike Russia’s oil infrastructure – which funds a significant chunk of the Russian war economy.
Russian air defences shot down 84 drones over Russian regions, including 36 over the Rostov region, according to the defence ministry.
Rostov Acting Governor Yuri Slyusar said Ukraine had struck the region with at least 13 missiles and dozens of drones, triggering a fire at the Novoshakhtinsk oil refinery, which has repeatedly been targeted by Ukraine.
At least one person was injured during the attack, Slyusar said. The fire was put out early on Thursday.
It was not immediately clear which missiles Ukraine fired at Rostov, though Kyiv struck a Russian military airfield earlier this month with U.S.-made ATACMS missiles prompting a major Russian attack on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure.
After approval from the administration of U.S. President Joe Biden, Ukraine struck Russia with six U.S.-made ATACMS on November 19 and with British Storm Shadow missiles and U.S.-made HIMARS on November 21.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, after those attacks, fired a new intermediate-range hypersonic ballistic missile known as “Oreshnik”, or Hazel Tree, at Ukraine on November 21.
Andriy Kovalenko, the head of Ukraine’s official Centre Against Disinformation, wrote on Telegram that the missile attack focused on the Kamensky chemical plant “which produces rocket fuel specialising in solid fuel components for rocket engines”.
Russian forces hit military targets in Ukraine with long-range high-precision weapons on Friday in response to an attack on Russia’s Rostov region this week in which Ukraine used U.S.- and British-supplied missiles, the Russian Defence Ministry said.
Russia said on Thursday that Ukraine had launched six U.S.-made long-range ATACMs missiles and four British-made Storm Shadow missiles at Russia’s southern Rostov region a day earlier.
Ukrainian officials said the Russian missile attack on Friday had killed one person and damaged buildings across Kyiv after explosions were heard in Ukraine’s capital.
The Russian Defence Ministry said in a statement that it had struck a command centre belonging to Ukraine’s SBU intelligence agency, the Luch design bureau in Kyiv which it said was involved with designing and making missiles. The Russians also claim to have hit a U.S.-made Patriot anti-aircraft missile system.
Team Bharatshakti
(With inputs from Reuters)
