Russia strikes industrial facilities in Ukraine as mutual drone attacks continue

Russia’s Ministry of Defence says its forces have struck several industrial facilities across Ukraine, as Moscow continues its targeted campaign against Kyiv’s industrial infrastructure.

The ministry said on Saturday that Russian forces hit Ukrainian steelmaker Zaporizhstal in the southeastern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia.

It also claimed to have hit an Interpipe Steel complex in the central city of Dnipro and several plants in Kryvyi Rih, also located in the country’s south and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s hometown.

The ministry added that two ⁠cargo vessels were also hit overnight in ⁠the Black Sea port of Chornomorsk, the Interfax news agency ‌reported.

These attacks came after Ukraine launched drones on industrial facilities in Russia’s Samara region, Interfax reported, citing regional Governor Vyacheslav Fedorishchev.

Russia’s Defence Ministry said its forces had downed 230 Ukrainian drones overnight over more than a dozen Russian regions, as well as over Crimea and the Azov and Black seas.

Ilya Sukhikh, mayor of the city of Togliatti in the Samara region, said several residential buildings were damaged and one person was injured.

In a separate attack, four commercial properties were set ablaze in the city of Taganrog in the Rostov region, local Mayor Svetlana Kambulova said, according to Russian news agency TASS.

Since its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Russia has systematically attacked Ukraine’s power grid, defence plants and logistics hubs to disrupt local arms production, choke civilian electricity and heating, and undermine supply networks.

Ukraine has launched its own aggressive long-range campaign against Russia’s industrial infrastructure, including dozens of oil refineries, disrupting Russia’s war revenue and causing domestic fuel shortages.

Deadly attacks in Kyiv

On Friday, at least two people were killed in Russian strikes on two petrol stations in Kyiv.

Russia also hit fuel stations in Kyiv on Thursday, suggesting a new campaign focused on civilian areas in the capital.

Three people were killed in Russian attacks in southeastern Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk and Zaporizhzhia regions and in Kharkiv in the northeast, according to the governors of those regions.

A further 12 people, including a 12-year-old boy, were injured in Kyiv, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said.

One person was also killed in the Kyiv region surrounding the capital, the regional governor said.

Meanwhile, Ukraine carried out drone attacks on Russia, killing one in the Kursk region, according to local officials.

In Russia’s Belgorod region, a frequent target of Ukrainian forces, one person died in a Ukrainian drone attack, local officials said. The head of Russian-controlled parts of the eastern Donetsk region said two local gas company employees were killed in a drone attack.

Two people were injured in a Ukrainian missile attack that hit two residential buildings and damaged an industrial facility in Volgograd, south of Saratov on the Volga River, local authorities said, without identifying the industrial facility.