A day after one of the largest attacks on Ukraine's territory since the full-scale invasion, Kiev fired 13 missiles and 32 drones at the Russian regions of Bryansk, Belgorod, Oryol, Kursk (near the border with Ukraine) and Moscow. The local authorities of Belgorod and Bryansk assure that there were at least 14 dead, including three children, and a hundred injured in the attacks, which, according to the Russian command, were cluster bombs like those used by the United States. The United States sent them in October, as well as Czech-made Vampire missiles. Ukraine has confirmed to several local media outlets that it was behind the attack, that it was focused on “military targets” and that the damage was caused by remnants of Russian air defenses. The attack on Russian territory this Saturday is the one that has caused the most damage since the start of the large-scale war that has intensified in recent days. The Kremlin has promised an answer. “This crime will not go unpunished,” the Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement. Hours later, it launched an attack on Kharkiv in the east, about 30 kilometers from the border with Russia.
The bombing of Kharkiv, Ukraine's second-largest city before the conflict, affected civilian infrastructure, a hotel and residential buildings, according to authorities, who put the number of injured at eight. Moscow, which defended Friday that it was pursuing “military objectives” after the massive attack on Ukraine that killed at least 39 people, has requested that a meeting of the United Nations Security Council be called to discuss the bombing of Belgorod and Belgorod to discuss Bryansk. He claims that Ukraine wanted to “provoke” a reaction from Moscow and that its units in the region foiled an “attempt by the Kiev regime to carry out a terrorist attack.” “The Kiev regime that committed this crime is trying to divert attention from the defeats at the front,” the Defense Ministry statement said. Belgorod Governorate, an area where Ukrainian forces have already carried out raids, reported that these attacks damaged dozens of houses and power lines and disrupted water supplies.
In Kiev, where, like other cities in Ukraine – 120 large and small towns according to President Volodymyr Zelensky – there was a massive attack on Friday, the death toll is now 16 in the capital alone and at least 39 in the country overall. The bombing using drones and a wide range of rockets (almost 160 projectiles) was the “deadliest” for the civilian population, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said on his social networks on Saturday. In the Ukrainian cities attacked on Friday, citizens face some fear as New Year's celebrations begin this Sunday, one of the major traditional holidays for the Russian-occupied country.
View of the damaged building after a bomb attack in Belgorod (Russia), this Saturday.AP/LAPRESSE
Western analysts and officials believe Russia has reserved cruise missiles in recent months to build up reserves and trigger massive winter storms like this Friday. They also warn that the combination of drones and missiles is aimed at locating anti-aircraft installations and their gaps. In fact, none of the ballistic or cruise missiles fired by Moscow's troops were intercepted. The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine assured on Saturday that they shot down a dozen Iranian-made Shahed drones in the Kherson, Khmelnytskyi and Mikolaiv regions.
For his part, the governor of Bryansk, Alexander Bogomaz, assures that the Ukrainian attacks were directed against “civilian targets,” according to the Interfax agency. The Russian army also claims to have shot down a Ukrainian maritime drone that was en route to the Crimean peninsula, which has been occupied by Russia since 2014. According to multiple Kiev intelligence reports, one of the attacks targeted an electronics factory where Kremlin troops produce military equipment such as long-range missiles and anti-aircraft systems. Moscow claims that all of them were civilian targets.
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