Russia blames Ukraine for missile strike on border city

The Kremlin accused Kyiv of firing a missile at a Russian city near the Ukrainian border that wounded 15 people and threatened retaliation – as Moscow’s forces pounded a strategically important village that had just been recaptured by Ukraine.

Russian air defense shot down a Ukrainian missile over the city of Taganrog in the Rostov region, located less than 25 miles east of the Ukrainian border, reported the Russian Defense Ministry.

Debris from the missile landed in the center of the city, leaving 15 people injured, according to local officials, who reported no fatalities.

Rostov regional Gov. Vasily Golubev said on Telegram that a café and a museum had been damaged in Taganrog, and that the windows of an apartment building had been blown out on impact.

Videos taken at the scene showed a part of a building lying in ruins.

A second missile was intercepted by air defenses elsewhere in the region, but it fell in a deserted area without causing any harm, Golubev added.

Earlier in the day, a Ukrainian drone was shot down outside Moscow, the Defense Ministry said. No injuries or damage were reported.

Maria Zakharova, a Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, said that Moscow “reserves the right to take tough retaliatory measures” in the wake of the missile attack in Taganrog, which she said was “directed against the civilian population and peaceful infrastructure.”

Oleksiy Danilov, Ukraine’s secretary of the National Security and Defense Council, blamed “the completely illiterate actions” of Russian air defense systems’ operators for the blast in Taganrog, but he did not elaborate further.

Three months ago, a Russian warplane accidentally dropped a bomb on the city of Belgorod, injuring two people, in an incident that was initially blamed on Ukraine.

Ukraine rarely comments on — or takes responsibility for — attacks inside Russia or on its occupied territories, which have included drone strikes targeting the Kremlin and missile strikes against ammunition depots and bridges used to supply Moscow’s soldiers.

Meanwhile, Russian military bloggers reported that Moscow’s forces have been hammering the village of Staromaiorske in the Donetsk region with artillery fire after it had been seized by Ukrainian troops this week as part of their intensifying counteroffensive.

Control of the village could open the way for Ukrainian forces to push deeper into Russian-held territory in the south, the bloggers said.

Col.-Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi, commander of Ukraine’s armed forces, said his troops were advancing in the Russia-occupied eastern Ukraine but meeting stiff resistance.

Main sites of the Ukrainian counteroffensive

1. Melitopol: Kyiv’s forces continued advancing toward the city of Melitopol on the Sea of Azov in the south. If Ukraine were to claw back Melitopol, it could bring it closer to breaking through the Russia-held land corridor linking the annexed Crimean Peninsula to mainland Russia, splitting Moscow’s forces in two and cutting their supply lines.
2. Zaporizhzhia: Intense battles raged in the southeastern Zaporizhzhia region, where US officials said Kyiv has launched its “main thrust” aimed at retaking 20% of its occupied territory. While Moscow claimed to have repelled Ukraine’s attacks involving dozens of armored vehicles and inflicted heavy losses on Kyiv’s troops, the Institute for the Study of War reported that the Ukrainian offensive appeared to have broken through some Russian defenses.
3. Donetsk: Ukrainian troops on Thursday recaptured the strategically significant village of Staromaiorske located in the Donetsk region south of a cluster of settlements along the Mokri Yaly river that Kyiv had seized at the start of the counteroffensive. Control of the village could open the way for Ukraine to push southward toward the coast.
4. Bakhmut: Ukrainian forces were said to be “gradually moving forward” near Bakhmut in the east, where Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar claimed Russians were dying at a rate eight times higher than Ukrainians. Geolocated footage showed that Kyiv’s troops have made gains south of the town of Klishchiivka, and additional fighting was reported near the settlements of Kudriumivka and Andriivka.

“The enemy fiercely clings to every centimeter, conducting intense artillery and mortar fire,” he said in a statement.

US officials said Thursday that Ukraine had launched the “main thrust” of its counteroffensive in the southeast aimed at liberating vast swaths of its territory.

Putin acknowledged that fighting has intensified there, but insisted Kyiv’s efforts have failed thanks to the “heroism” of the Russian soldiers.

The pace of Ukraine’s counteroffensive has been slow so far, with Kyiv’s forces having to contend with vast minefields and well-fortified Russian defenses, which the enemy had had months to prepare.

On Friday, Ukrainians fighting in the Zaporizhzhia region in the south for the first time encountered one of Russia’s “dragon’s teeth” fortifications made up of rows of concrete pyramids designed to impede the movement of tanks, according to a new video that has been circulating online.

With Post wires