By Guy Faulconbridge and Alexander Marrow
MOSCOW, May 27 (Reuters) – Ukraine attacked pipeline facilities inside Russia on Saturday with a series of drones, including a Druzhba pipeline station, killing at least two people, officials and media said. of Russian communication
Ukrainian drone strikes inside Russia have increased in recent weeks, with the New York Times reporting that US intelligence believes Ukraine was behind a drone attack on the Kremlin earlier this month. .
Ukraine has not publicly acknowledged launching attacks against targets inside Russia. The Ukrainian Defense Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Saturday.
In the Tver region, northwest of Moscow, two drones attacked a station that services the Druzhba (Friendship) oil pipeline, one of the largest in the world, according to the Kommersant newspaper.
The Tver city council reported that a drone had crashed near the town of Erokhino, some 500 kilometers from the border with Ukraine.
The Baza Telegram channel, which has good sources among the Russian security services, claimed that the drones attacked a station that services the Druzhba pipeline.
In Russia’s Belgorod region, Ukrainian shelling killed at least one person and wounded three, including a 15-year-old girl and a 17-year-old man, said Vyacheslav Gladkov, the region’s governor.
Gladkov, whose region borders Ukraine and was targeted by pro-Ukrainian fighters this week, said a power line was also damaged. In the Kursk region, a construction worker was killed in a shelling near the border with Ukraine, according to the local governor.
The Soviet-built Druzhba has the capacity to pump more than 2 million barrels per day (bpd), but it has been underutilized since Europe cut its imports of Russian energy after President Vladimir Putin sent troops to Ukraine last year. .
Russian pipeline operator Transneft had said earlier this month that a filling point in Druzhba, in a Russian region bordering Ukraine, had been attacked. (Written by Alexander Marrow in London and Guy Faulconbridge in Moscow; edited in Spanish by Javier López de Lérida)
Source: Ambito
