Ukraine has hit a Russian chemical plant with Storm Shadow missiles, its military said on Tuesday, referring to the UK-made long-range weapon.
Calling the strike “a successful hit” that penetrated the Russian air defence system, Ukraine’s general staff of the armed forces said they were still assessing the outcome of the “massive” strike.
Hours later Russia launched a heavy drone and missile attack on several Ukrainian regions, leaving six people dead, including two children, according to President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Emergency power outages were in place in Kyiv itself as well as the Kyiv and Dnipropetrovsk regions, and reports said Russia had targeted thermal power plants.
Two people were killed in strikes on the capital, and a woman and two children were killed in the wider Kyiv region, officials said.
Meanwhile, Russian authorities have not yet commented on the strike on the Bryansk chemical plant, although it has warned the West not to give Ukraine long-range missiles.
Ukraine’s military said it was imperative to target Russian facilities that play a key role in Moscow’s war against Ukraine: “The Bryansk Chemical Plant is a key facility of the aggressor state’s military-industrial complex”, it said on X.
It added that the plant “produces gunpowder, explosives and rocket fuel components used in ammunition and missiles employed by the enemy to shell the territory of Ukraine”.
The attack came on the same day that UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and other European leaders vowed to “ramp up the pressure on Russia’s economy and its defence industry” until Russian leader Vladimir Putin “is ready to make peace”.
Credit: bbc.com
