A Russian attack on a town west of the Ukrainian city of Donetsk close to Ukraine’s eastern front, injured 13 people, a local official said early Friday.
Two airstrikes on the town caused a fire, Roman Padun, the administrative head of the town of Kurakhove, told public broadcaster Suspilne.
Russia and Ukraine have recently experienced "unusually intense" attacks "deep behind their lines," the British Defense Ministry said Friday in its daily intelligence update on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. In the last four days, the ministry said, there have been reports of explosions at Russian logistics sites, air bases and command posts in Crimea, the Russian Krasnodar region and near Moscow.
The ministry also said it is "highly likely" that Russia’s Black Sea Fleet has been "heavily targeted" again. Explosions at the Chkalovsky Air Base are particularly sensitive, the report said, because that is where special military aircraft used by Russian VIPs are housed.
The site also plays host to Coot special mission aircraft, which conduct electronic intelligence-gathering missions.
On Thursday, the Ukrainian military said its forces had hit a Russian air base in Crimea, which a Russian-installed official on the annexed peninsula disputed.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian officials said Thursday that Russian forces carried out aerial attacks on multiple cities overnight, killing at least two people.
Ukraine’s military described the Russian action as a "massive missile attack on the civilian infrastructure of a number of regions."
Oleksandr Prokudin, the regional governor of Kherson, said a Russian strike hit a residential building, killing two people and injuring five others.
Sergiy Popko, the head of Kyiv's military administration, said on Telegram that debris fell on the Ukrainian capital after air defenses shot down Russian missiles.
Kyiv Mayor Vitalii Klitschko said seven people were injured and several buildings were damaged.
In northeastern Ukraine, the regional governor of Kharkiv, Oleh Syniehubov, said at least six Russian strikes hit the city of Kharkiv and damaged civilian infrastructure.
Russia said Thursday it destroyed 19 Ukrainian drones over the annexed Crimean Peninsula and nearby Black Sea.
The Russian defense ministry said it also downed three Ukrainian drones over the Kursk, Belgorod and Orlov regions of Russia.
Poland aid
Poland said Thursday it will only supply Ukraine with previously agreed to deliveries of ammunition and armaments.
The statement from a government spokesperson came a day after Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki announced an end to weapons transfers to Ukraine as Poland works to arm itself "with the most modern weapons."
There have been tensions between Poland and Ukraine since Poland instituted a temporary ban on imports of grain from Ukraine to protect Polish farmers.
Ukraine on Thursday pushed for a deal with Poland to end the grain restrictions.
"There is no person in Ukraine who would be interested in creating any problems for Polish farmers," Ukraine’s ambassador to Poland, Vasyl Zvarych, told Poland’s state-run news agency PAP.
Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
