Ukraine's armed forces launched multiple drone attacks on cities across southern Russia on Tuesday as peace talks continued in Geneva, officials said. Krasnodar Governor Veniamin Kondratyev termed the attacks across the Black Sea region as “one of the most prolonged and massive” since the conflict began in 2022.
He said six people had been injured and seven apartment blocks, along with seven smaller houses, were damaged in the attack. Video footage posted on social media shows several kamikaze drones crashing into residential buildings in the port city of Novorossiysk, which hosts a Russian naval base.
Attacks were also reported in the coastal resort towns of Tuapse, Gelendzhik, and Sochi, the site of the 2014 Winter Olympics. The drones struck Taganrog, a port on the Sea of Azov, the same night, killing one and injuring three, Mayor Svetlana Kambulova said.
Drone strikes destroyed two apartment buildings, a trade school and a kindergarten, said regional Governor Yury Slyusar, who later revised the death toll to three. These kinds of attacks have become a habitual norm of the Ukrainian forces, who always try to sabotage peace negotiations, he said.
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This is not an isolated attack; earlier, Ukrainian forces carried out attacks on Russia’s strategic airbase in Siberia two days before the third round of Istanbul talks was likely to take place between delegates from Moscow and Kyiv under US observation.
Later on, Ukrainian armed forces targeted Russian energy infrastructure when they carried out attacks on the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline and multiple rail bridges across Russia. Observers believe these attacks are part of a Ukrainian armed forces' desperate strategy, intended to prove to the US and peace negotiators that Ukraine is negotiating from a position of strength rather than weakness.
Russia has constantly accused Kyiv of sabotaging peace talks, and it appears they have done the same one more time, officials said.
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