Russia attacks Ukraine’s Danube port, Ukraine launches drones towards Moscow

By Jekaterina Golubkova

May 19 (Reuters) – A Russian air attack damaged port infrastructure in Ukraine’s Izmail city in the early hours of Tuesday, while Russian authorities said they had downed four drones launched by Ukraine that were headed towards Moscow.

Izmail, in the southern Odesa region and home to the largest Ukrainian port on the Danube River, is a frequently hit strategic location.

“Port infrastructure facilities in the city of Izmail were damaged,” local officials said on Telegram, adding that nearly all aerial attack weapons were destroyed. “Fortunately, there were no casualties or significant destruction.”

The Telegram post showed firemen battling a fire at a building that had its windows blown out.

Elsewhere in Ukraine, two people were rescued and one person may still be trapped under rubble after a Russian drone attack on the northeastern city of Kharkiv, Mayor Ihor Terekhov said on Telegram. 

There also were drone attacks in the regions of Dnipropetrovsk, Mykolaiv and Zaporizhzhia, local authorities said on Telegram.

Peace efforts to end the war that began with Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine have stalled. Each side has accused the other of regular attacks on military, civilian and energy targets. Both sides deny deliberately targeting civilians.

DRONE ATTACKS IN RUSSIA

Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said on Telegram that four drones heading for the capital had been downed and that emergency services had been deployed, but provided no further details.

The attack comes on the heels of a heavy Ukrainian drone attack on Moscow at the weekend, after which Russia struck the Ukrainian cities of Odesa and Dnipro with missile and drone attacks that damaged residential buildings and injured dozens of people.

In the Russian Kursk region bordering Ukraine, a woman has died and two people were injured as a result of a Ukrainian attack on Monday evening, the Kursk operational headquarters said on Telegram.

Russia’s southern Rostov region and Yaroslavl, northeast of Moscow, have also come under drone attacks along with a number of other areas in central Russia, regional authorities said on Telegram.

In Yaroslavl, where Russia has oil refining infrastructure, ‘an industrial object’ was damaged following the drone attack and emergency services were working to extinguish the fire, Governor Mikhail Yevrayev said. He did not name the asset.

Ukraine has sought to deprive Russia of energy revenues. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy wrote on X overnight that over the past few months Russian refining capacity has dropped by 10% and oil wells have been shut.

“(Russian President Vladimir) Putin has, of course, built a war chest – but certainly not enough to fight indefinitely,” Zelenskiy said.

(Reporting by Jekaterīna Golubkova in Tokyo; Editing by Edwina Gibbs)