Moscow, July 21 (SANA) Russian regions, including Lipetsk and Volgograd, came under overnight missile and drone attacks launched from Ukraine, targeting industrial facilities and triggering large fires, while Russian drones struck a major energy facility in the northeastern Ukrainian city of Sumy.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said Tuesday that Russian fibre-optic-guided KVN drones targeted technological equipment at the Sumskaya gas compressor station, part of the country’s main gas pipeline network in Sumy, according to Sputnik.
The ministry also said Russian forces had earlier struck infrastructure used to unload and store military cargo at the port of Chornomorsk in Ukraine’s Odesa region.
Meanwhile, Ukraine’s state news agency Ukrinform reported missile and drone strikes on the Russian cities of Lipetsk and Volgograd, causing fires near key industrial sites.
According to the report, a fire broke out between Lipetsk Thermal Power Plant No. 2 and the Novolipetsk Steel Plant following the Ukrainian strikes.
The Novolipetsk facility is Russia’s largest steel producer, accounting for about 20% of the country’s total steel output, while the nearby power plant supplies heat and electricity to Lipetsk and surrounding industrial facilities.
Authorities in Volgograd also declared a missile alert overnight after residents reported powerful explosions across the city.
Russia’s Emergency Ministry said a major fire engulfed a polymer materials plant within the Ladoga industrial complex, spreading across approximately 5,900 square meters and affecting both a warehouse and a production building.
Since early July, the Russia–Ukraine war has entered a new phase of reciprocal escalation, with both sides increasingly targeting economic assets and critical infrastructure in an effort to raise the strategic cost of the conflict.
Ukraine has intensified long-range strikes on oil, energy and logistics facilities inside Russia, while Moscow has stepped up attacks on Ukrainian ports, fuel depots, grain storage facilities and commercial vessels linked to Kyiv’s agricultural exports.
R.H/MZN
