KYIV: Ukraine said on Sunday it had struck a second key bridge in the Kursk region, seeking to disrupt Moscow’s supply routes as Kyiv’s unprecedented incursion on Russian soil stretched through its second week.

Russia meanwhile ramped up pressure in east Ukraine, claiming to capture another village just a few kilometres from the Ukrainian-held logistics hub of Pokrovsk.

“Minus one more bridge,” Ukrainian Air Force Commander Mykola Oleshchuk said on Tele­gram, publishing an aerial video of a blast tearing through a bridge near the Russian town of Zvannoye.

“The Air Force aviation continues to deprive the enemy of logistical capabilities with precision air strikes,” he said.

Attacks on bridges have left Russia with limited options to cross the Seym River

Kyiv sent troops and armoured vehicles across the border on August 6, in its biggest attack on Russian territory since the Kremlin launched its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. On Friday, Ukraine announced it had destroyed a separate bridge in the neighbouring town of Glushkovo.

The attacks on both bridges, which lie on the river Seym that winds through Kursk, have left Russia with limited options to cross the river in the area, according to Russian military bloggers.

Moscow said the destruction of one of the bridges had hindered evacuation efforts. The Russian defence ministry said in a briefing it was pushing back against Ukraine’s forces near several villages. More than 120,000 people have fled the region since fighting began, according to Russian authorities.

‘Falling debris’

Ukrainian drones attacked an oil storage facility in Russia’s southern Rostov region early on Sunday morning, sparking a large fire, the local governor said.

Videos published on social media showed thick black smoke and bursts of flames coming from the site of the blaze, which the governor said was in the town of Proletarsk.

“In the southeast of the Rostov region, air defences repelled a drone attack. As a result of falling debris on the territory of industrial storage facilities in Proletarsk, a diesel fuel fire broke out,” Governor Vasily Golubev said on Telegram.

“At 5:35[am], firefighting at the industrial facility in Proletarsk was suspended due to a second drone attack,” he added in an update to the post. No one was injured and firefighting efforts resumed shortly after, he said in a later post.

A source in Ukraine’s intelligence services said the installations were part of Russia’s “military-industrial complex”. Proletarsk is some 250 kilometres from the Ukraine border and some 350 kilometres from Kyiv-held areas of fighting on the eastern Ukrainian front line.

Published in Dawn, August 19th, 2024