Four Ukrainian drones were shot down over the territory of the Rostov region at night, while another one was shot down over the territory of the Belgorod region, the Ministry of Defense of Russia announced, reports BBC and News.bg.
At night, the governor of the Rostov region Vasiliy Golubev reported in "Telegram" that four kamikaze drones were destroyed at 03:10 in Novoshakhtinsk. "According to preliminary data, no casualties or damage to objects were registered as a result of the attack,", he wrote.
The governor did not specify the purpose of the attack.
A month ago, on March 13, debris from three drones fell on the territory of the Novoshakhtinsk Oil Products Plant, the largest supplier of petroleum products in southern Russia and the only refinery in the Rostov region. The technological facilities of the enterprise were stopped, Golubev announced at the time.
This year, Russian refineries have been subject to regular drone attacks, which has affected oil refining volumes. Russia, for its part, has resumed massive attacks on energy infrastructure since March, the latest of which was the day before, on April 11. On the night of April 12, the Russian military again attacked energy infrastructure in various regions of Ukraine with drones, the Ukrainian army announced.
The day before, Russian President Vladimir Putin commented on the exchange of blows for the first time. "Unfortunately, we have recently witnessed a series of attacks on our energy facilities and we had to respond," he said. At the same time, Putin claims that during the winter Russia did not destroy the Ukrainian energy industry "for humanitarian reasons". "But after the attacks on our energy facilities, we were forced to respond," he said on Thursday evening, receiving Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko in the Kremlin.