Ukraine, Russia trade drone strikes

Ukraine and Russia exchanged overnight drone strikes into early yesterday, with Ukraine hitting oil refineries and a petrochemicals plant while Russia attacked railway stations and electrical substations.

Ukraine’s strikes hit an apartment block in Russia’s central Tatarstan injuring three, and Russia’s attack in Ukraine’s Sumy region killed a railway worker, officials said.

The strikes follow large air attacks by Russia on Ukraine in recent weeks, while Kyiv has intensified long-range drone strikes on Russian oil facilities, leading to shortages of fuel in Crimea and elsewhere.

Russian drones attacked railway stations, electrical signalling posts and substations in Ukraine’s northern Sumy region, killing a railway worker and injuring another one, the chief executive of Ukraine’s state railway Ukrzaliznytsia said yesterday.

The attack followed an overnight one on Thursday when a railway worker was killed and four injured in an attack on the town of Konotop, also in the Sumy region.

Ukraine’s military said it struck Tatneft’s oil refinery TANECO in the city of Nizhnekamsk in Tatarstan overnight, which it described as one of the biggest in Russia with an annual design capacity of over 16 million tonnes.

It also said in a statement on the Telegram messaging app that it struck the TAIF-NK refinery in Nizhnekamsk, adding that it confirmed fire at both refineries.

The Tatarstan regional head said earlier that industrial facilities in Tatarstan were targeted, while Nizhnekamsk cancelled public events yesterday amid the threat of drone attacks, the city’s mayor said.