MOSCOW: A Ukrainian drone strike on a space in a Russian border village killed five people, in addition to two children, the regional governor said Saturday.
The drone hit a space in the village of Gorodishche, a small town in Russia’s Kursk region, just a few meters from the border with Ukraine.
“To our great regret, five other people died. . . as well as two small children. Two other relatives are in serious condition,” Kursk Governor Alexei Smirnov said in a Telegram post.
The attack was carried out with an unmanned “helicopter,” he added, a small device that can be configured to drop grenades or other explosives on targets.
Both sides have made extensive use of drones, adding larger self-detonating devices with a range of up to hundreds of kilometers, the standoff that began in February 2022.
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Ukraine has stepped up its attacks on Russian territory this year, whether it is sites of power that it says are a source of the Russian military, as well as towns and villages just across the border.
Russian President Vladimir Putin last month introduced a new primary offensive in Ukraine’s northeastern Kharkiv region in what he called an operation to create a “buffer zone” and push Ukrainian forces back to Russia’s border region of Belgorod to avoid shelling.
The Kursk region, where Saturday’s attack took place, is to the north, unlike Ukraine’s Sumy region, which is controlled through Kyiv.