©Reuters. Military personnel are seen in the aftermath of what local authorities said was a Ukrainian missile attack, amid the Russia-Ukraine conflict in Belgorod, Russia, March 17, 2024. Governor of the Belgorod Region/Vyacheslav Gladkov via Telegram/Handout
(Reuters) – Ukraine launched 35 drones at targets across Russia that caused a brief fire at an oil refinery, targeted Moscow and disrupted electricity supplies in border areas, it said Russia on Sunday, the last day of the presidential elections.
Moscow accused Kiev of election sabotage with days of attacks on Russian infrastructure, one of the largest air operations on Russian territory since President Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion of neighboring Ukraine two years ago.
Putin, all but certain to win re-election, has vowed to punish Ukraine for the attacks.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy thanked his military forces and intelligence services for new “long-range capabilities” in his nightly video address Saturday, without mentioning reported intensified attacks by his nation’s forces.
The Russian Defense Ministry wrote on the Telegram messaging app on Sunday that 17 drones were destroyed in the southern Krasnodar region, four in the Moscow region and the rest in six other regions.
“The drones were neutralized, but due to the fall of one of the devices a fire broke out,” the operational headquarters of the Krasnodar region in southern Russia said on Telegram.
The fire at the Slavyansk refinery in Krasnodar was put out and there were no casualties, although preliminary information indicates that one person died of a heart attack, the administration said.
Roman Siniagovskyi, head of the Slavyansk administrative district, said on Telegram that refinery workers had been evacuated and that there was no threat to nearby populated areas from the accident.
Reuters could not independently verify the reports.
Ukrainian newspaper Ukrainska Pravda quoted a Ukrainian intelligence source as saying Kiev considered the drone raid a success because a large fire broke out near crude distillation units that were the main target.
The Slavyansk refinery, about 70 km (45 miles) north of Krasnodar, processes about 4.5 million tonnes of crude a year, producing fuel mainly for export, but also sells gasoline domestically.
A Ukrainian intelligence source told Reuters on Sunday that long-range Ukrainian attack drones launched by the SBU’s internal security service had so far hit 12 Russian oil refineries during the war.
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said there were no casualties or damage reported from drones shot down over three districts near Moscow.
North of Moscow, four drones were destroyed in the Yaroslavl region, with no damage or injuries reported, Governor Mikhail Yevrayev said on Telegram.
In the border region of Belgorod, an attack by four drones launched from Ukraine damaged electricity and gas lines in a village, Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said.
The Russian Defense Ministry said Russian forces also shot down 12 rockets fired from Ukraine towards the Belgorod region on Sunday.
As Russia faced attacks from Ukraine, Kiev’s military said Sunday that Russian airstrikes had damaged agricultural businesses and destroyed several industrial buildings in the Black Sea port of Odessa overnight.