MOSCOW: Ukraine fired nine US ATACMS at Crimea and attacked Russian regions with at least 60 drones in a major attack that forced one oil refinery in southern Russia to halt operations, Russian officials said on Sunday.
Russian air defences shot down nine ATACMS missiles over Crimea along with 57 drones over Russia’s Krasnodar region and three drones over Belgorod region, the defence ministry said.
Local officials said six drones crashed onto the territory of an oil refinery in Slavyansk in Russia’s southern Krasnodar region. Interfax news agency said the refinery halted work after the attack. TASS quoted an official at the refinery as saying the charges carried by the Ukrainian-launched drones were bigger than previous attacks and that they included steel balls.
Slavyansk refinery is a private plant with a capacity of 4 million metric tons of oil per year, about 1 million bpd.
There was no immediate comment from Kyiv.
Russia has reported a rise in Ukrainian attacks on its territory since its forces opened a new front in northeastern Ukraine’s Kharkiv region earlier this month. President Vladimir Putin says Russia is carving out a buffer zone there to protect Russia from such attacks, which Russia says risk triggering a broader war between Russia and the West if Ukraine uses Western weapons. Putin said on Friday that Russia had no plans currently to take Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-biggest city, The White House said on Friday that US policy on not encouraging Ukaine’s use of US weapons against Russian sovereign territory had not changed. –Agencies
