Russia attacked Zaporizhia for the first time with explosive-laden “kamikaze drones” after a rocket attack on a residential building in the city left 11 dead.
Regional governor Alexander Starukh said the Iranian-made Shahed-136 drones damaged two infrastructure facilities in the city. He said other rockets also hit the city again, injuring one person.
As its military loses ground to Ukraine’s counteroffensive, Moscow has begun deploying drones to attack Ukrainian targets. According to the Ukrainian military, “kamikaze drones” are cheaper and less sophisticated than missiles, but have proven effective at damaging targets on the ground. The Shahed-136 drones are capable of staying in the air for several hours and circling over potential targets before being flown into enemy troops, armor or buildings and exploding on impact.
On Monday, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Khanani denied supplying the drones to Russia, calling the claims “baseless.” However, the Ukrainian military said its forces had shot down more than 20 drones in the past 24 hours, and that most were Iranian.
On Wednesday, Russia allegedly deployed six more drones to bomb Bila Tserka, a town about 55 miles (90 km) from Kyiv, injuring one person, according to the regional governor.
The scene of an airstrike over Bila Church earlier in the week. Photo: Sergey Supinsky/AFP/Getty Images
“This is a new threat to all defense forces [of Ukraine] and we must use all available means to try to counter it,” Ukrainian Air Force spokesman Yuriy Ignat said, comparing the drone’s small size to an artillery shell.
Kyiv claims Moscow began using Iranian drones in September, targeting power plants, power lines and water pipes with long-range weapons.
According to the Washington Institute for the Study of War, Iran’s drones are unlikely to significantly affect the course of the war.
“They have used a lot of drones against civilian targets in rear areas, probably hoping to generate non-linear effects through terror.” Such efforts are not successful,” analysts from the think tank wrote.
Ukraine’s state emergency service said the death toll from rocket attacks on the city of Zaporizhia on Thursday rose to 11 after seven rockets were fired before dawn at residential buildings.
At least 15 people are still missing, according to city officials.
“There are no military or important sites near the site of the strike, only civilian buildings and apartment blocks,” Staruch said.
Thursday’s attacks came a day after Russia said it considered the entire Zaporozhye region, including the city of Zaporizhia, to be part of Russia. A law signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin makes clear that Russia claims the four regions it illegally annexed in their entirety — despite the fact that Russia does not fully control any of them and is in retreat.
Zaporozhye, near Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, has been the target of several fatal attacks in the past week. Last week, 30 people were killed and 88 injured when a rocket hit the city. Some of the victims waited in line on the outskirts of the city to enter the occupied territories, while others waited at a bus stop.
In another development, at least five people were killed and as many injured after Ukrainian forces hit a bus while shelling a strategically important bridge in the Russian-controlled part of Ukraine’s southern Kherson region, Russia’s TASS news agency reported.
Ukraine continues to advance in the east and south of the country, with Russian troops retreating under pressure on both fronts.
President Volodymyr Zelensky announced in his evening address on Thursday that Ukrainian forces have liberated more than 500 square kilometers of territory in Kherson alone since the beginning of October.
But Russian-backed separatist forces said on Friday they had seized territory in Donetsk, their first claim of new gains, saying they had seized a string of villages near the industrial city of Bakhmut, which has been under Russian fire for weeks.
“On the territory of the Donetsk People’s Republic, a group of troops of the Donetsk and Luhansk Republics, with fire support from Russian forces, liberated Otradovka, Veselaya Dolina and Zaytsevo,” the separatists announced on social networks.
Putin appeared to concede the losses on Wednesday in a televised conversation with teachers, saying the Kremlin was “working on the assumption that the situation in the new territories will stabilize.”
Putin appears to acknowledge Russian losses in Ukraine – video
In a video addressed to Russian troops on Friday, Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov urged them to lay down their arms, promising them “life and safety” if they did.
“We guarantee life, security and justice to anyone who refuses immediate combat,” Reznikov said. “And we will get a tribunal for those who gave the criminal orders. You can still save Russia from tragedy and the Russian army from humiliation.
Reznikov said Russian troops had been “deceived and betrayed” by the Kremlin, citing how Moscow’s soldiers were now paying “in blood for someone’s fantasies and false goals.”
Military analysts say Russia is at its weakest point, has lost a mass of equipment and fighters, and is unlikely to regain ground unless its mobilization proves successful. Russia announced a partial mobilization of 300,000 people in September after losing control of half of Ukraine’s northeastern Kharkiv province.
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