Ukraine claims to have killed scores of Russians in two strikes in the country’s occupied regions, as Kyiv steps up mid-range drone attacks targeting Moscow’s military infrastructure.
One wave of strikes hit a Russian drone pilot training camp in the occupied town of Snizhne, killing at least 65 cadets and an instructor on Wednesday night, according to the commander of Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces.
Another set of strikes hit a Russian security service headquarters and an air defense system in the Kherson region in occupied Ukraine, killing and wounding almost 100 Russians, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky claimed Thursday. He did not say when the attack took place.
Ukrainian claims of such high casualty figures are unusual, and CNN cannot independently verify them. CNN has approached Russian authorities for comment.
On Friday, Russian acknowledged a third mass casualty attack, which President Vladimir Putin referred to as a “terrorist” act, saying that six people were killed and 39 injured when three waves of Ukrainian drones struck a college dormitory overnight in Starobilsk, an occupied town in Luhansk. Fifteen others are still missing, he added.
While Russian authorities haven’t commented on the other two attacks Ukraine claimed, throughout Thursday, Russia’s Defense Ministry touted gains it claims to have made on the front line.
The ministry also said Thursday it has delivered some nuclear munitions to storage sites in Belarus as part of a nuclear forces exercise. Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Belarusian counterpart, Alexander Lukashenko, led those exercises Thursday via video call, the Kremlin added.