Russian Strikes on Kyiv Petrol Stations and Ukrainian Attacks in Russia Escalate War
Escalation of Strikes Between Russia and Ukraine
Sept 11 (Reuters) - Russia attacked two Kyiv petrol stations with jet-powered drones early on Friday, killing two people in an escalation of strikes that President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said were becoming "increasingly terrorist in nature."
Two more people were killed in Russian strikes in southeastern Ukraine's Dnipropetrovsk region and in Kharkiv in the northeast, according to the regions' governors.
Ukraine also carried out drone attacks on Russia, killing two people in the Tula region overnight and one on Friday in the Kursk region, local officials said.
Stalled Front Lines and Shift to Economic Targets
With fighting on the front line largely stalled more than 4-1/2 years into the war in Ukraine, Moscow and Kyiv have increasingly struck logistics and other economic targets in recent weeks to try to damage the other's war effort.
Jet-Powered Drone Attacks on Kyiv
Russia has for two weeks been carrying out almost constant attacks with faster jet-powered drones that have killed a number of Kyiv residents and disrupted daily life in the capital. The attacks were paused while U.S. peace negotiators Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner visited Kyiv at the weekend, but then resumed.
"Russia's escalation with jet-powered 'shaheds' is gradually becoming increasingly terrorist in nature," Zelenskiy said on X.
Both sides deny targeting civilians in the war, triggered by Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022.
Attacks on Petrol Stations and Civilian Infrastructure
Details of Petrol Station Strikes
The two dead in Kyiv were at one of the two petrol stations that was attacked, officials said, one by a double-tap strike.
Friday's strikes followed what appeared to be the first attack on a Kyiv petrol station a day earlier. In recent months, Russia hit some 300 petrol stations, mainly in or near Ukraine's frontline regions.
"There is no military objective behind such strikes. This is terror of the civilian population," said Bohdan Kukura, CEO of Ukrainian oil company Ukrnafta.
Casualties and Damage in Kyiv and Other Regions
A further 12 people, including a 12-year-old boy, were injured in Kyiv, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said. An attack on a Kyiv residential block injured eight people overnight.
Zelenskiy said Russia had hit a building used by Ukraine's largest mobile operator Kyivstar in Kyiv, and there were strikes in eight other Ukrainian regions. Kyivstar's network continued to operate, the company said.
A woman was killed in the Kyiv region surrounding the capital, the regional governor said.
The governor of Dnipropetrovsk region, Oleksandr Hanzha, said one person was killed and 19 injured in attacks across his region. All but one of the injured were in the city of Dnipro.
A drone attack killed one person in the city of Kharkiv, regional governor Oleh Syniehubov said. And the Moscow-installed head of Russian-controlled parts of eastern Donetsk region said two local gas company employees were killed in a drone strike.
Escalating Strikes and Counterattacks
Ukrainian Attacks on Russian Economic Targets
Ukraine, in turn, has attacked Russia's largest online retailers and oil refineries, often deep inside the country, as well as energy and fuel logistics in regions of its own territory occupied by Russian forces.
Zelenskiy said Ukrainian forces had hit an enterprise and an oil industry facility in the Saratov and Volgograd regions. He also reported strikes on unnamed targets in other regions and the Black Sea.
Casualties and Damage in Russia
Dmitry Milyayev, the governor of Russia's Tula region, said two people had been killed and three injured in Ukrainian drone attacks overnight. A 37-year-old man had been killed in a Ukrainian drone strike in the Kursk region, its governor said.
Russian e-commerce company Ozon said a drone had caused a fire at its logistics hub in the central city of Saratov.
Over two dozen warehouses owned by Ozon and fellow online retailer Wildberries have been hit in recent attacks which Kyiv casts as part of a campaign against economic infrastructure underpinning Russia's war in Ukraine.
Ukraine's military said it had hit an oil refinery in Saratov.
Two people were injured in a missile attack that hit two residential buildings and damaged an industrial facility in Volgograd, south of Saratov on the Volga River, local authorities said, without identifying the industrial facility.
(Reporting by Gleb Garanich in Kyiv, Jekaterīna Golubkova in Tokyo, Anna Pruchnicka in Gdansk; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman, Michael Perry, Timothy Heritage and Ron Popeski)
