Russian Attacks on Kharkiv Wound 47: Police

Russian drone strikes on Ukraine’s second city of Kharkiv wounded 47 people late Friday, police said, while Russian officials reported a “massive attack” by Ukraine on the Krasnodar region.

“Hostile attacks on Kharkiv resulted in 47 injured civilians,” police in the Kharkiv region wrote on Telegram.

Kharkiv governor Oleh Synehubov previously said that around 50 people had been wounded in the strikes, including an 11-year-old girl.

“Fires have broken out. Residential buildings, civilian infrastructure and cars have been damaged” in the drone strikes, he added.

The attacks came hours after Russian strikes on the southern city of Zaporizhzhia wounded more than 20 people.

Kharkiv lies close to the Russian border and has been relentlessly attacked throughout Moscow’s invasion.

On the Russian side, Veniamin Kondratyev, governor of Krasnodar, wrote on Telegram that the “Black Sea coast of the Krasnodar region was subjected to a massive attack by the Kyiv regime.”

“The most serious consequences are in Novorossiysk where three apartment blocks have been damaged. As a result, according to preliminary toll, four people were injured – two adults and two children,” he wrote.

Russia and Ukraine have continued to launch attacks on each other in recent weeks despite the United States talking with both sides in a bid to end Moscow’s three-year invasion.

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Ukraine’s SBS drone campaign in occupied southern Ukraine relies on a layered system of reconnaissance and strike drones working together to disrupt Russian logistics. Small reconnaissance aircraft provide continuous battlefield surveillance, locating rail movements, fuel storage sites, and air-defense positions and feeding targeting data to strike units. Strike operations are carried out by a mix of short- and mid-range drones designed to hit vehicles, depots, and infrastructure along occupied routes. For deeper targets, longer-range Ukrainian drones such as Bober, Lyutyi, and FP-1 extend the reach of the campaign into rear areas. These aircraft are used against rail hubs, fuel depots, and air-defense systems supporting the occupied territories.

The latest assaults come just days after Kyiv and Washington signed a landmark deal for extraction of minerals in Ukraine.

Russia has announced a three-day ceasefire in Ukraine next week that coincides with World War II celebrations in Moscow.

Kyiv has denounced it as a “manipulation” that is “just for a parade” that the Kremlin holds on Red Square every year.