20 August 2023 , 08:03
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A major railway station in Russia was hit today by a suspected Ukrainian kamikaze drone strike, hurting five people, after Ukraine vowed revenge for a major missile attack yesterday.
The regional governor Roman Starovoyt said on Telegram that according to preliminary information, the drone crashed into the roof of the train station building, causing a fire to break out. Russia said this was one of three areas Ukrainian drones had struck on Sunday, forcing two of Moscow’s airports to divert flights.
It came as the city of Chernihiv woke up in mourning after a Russian missile attack yesterday left seven people dead and wounded 145 others. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky vowed in his evening address yesterday that Ukrainian soldiers would "respond tangibly" to the "terrorist" attack. Russia’s Kursk and Rostov regions, both of which border Ukraine, reported drone strikes while Russia’s defence ministry said it had jammed a Ukrainian drone in the Moscow region, forcing it to crash in an unpopulated area.
Roman Starovoit (2nd R) inspecting an area outside a damaged railway station building following a drone attack in Kursk (TELEGRAM / @gubernator_46/AFP vi)Starovoyt said of the attack on the station: "According to preliminary information, it crashed into the roof of the railway station building, after which a fire broke out on the roof. Five people were slightly injured by glass fragments." He also said: "Emergency services were on the scene." The station is on a line used to transport weapons, troops and ammunition to Vladimir Putin’s illegal war against Ukraine.
Kursk is the capital of a region bordering Ukraine and the Russians claimed the drone was disrupted by air defences and it was debris which fell on the roof of the railway station causing a fire. In Rostov region, two drones hit a military base in Kamensk, said regional governor Vasily Golubev. Another drone hit Novoshakhtinsk in the same region. The damage caused by the strikes was unclear.
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In Moscow, aircraft-type kamikaze drones aimed at the capital were downed using electronic warfare equipment, said the Russian defence ministry. Mayor Sergey Sobyanin said: "At night an attempt was made to fly a drone to Moscow from a southerly direction. It was stopped by the air defence forces."
Images in the wake of the attack in Ukraine — around 80 miles north of the capital, Kyiv, and far from the front lines of the war — showed badly damaged buildings. A theatre's roof was blown away and survivors walked amid the debris with bloodstained clothes. Oleksandr Lomako, the city's mayor, wrote on Telegram: "This strike is another war crime by the occupiers against the civilian population. This is a very quiet centre, many people and children walk here at lunchtime in beautiful weather." He also declared a national period of mourning until 21 August.