Russian forces launched waves of drones on the Odesa area of southern Ukraine in an hourslong in a single day assault, officers stated on Sunday, the newest bombardment to focus on port infrastructure since Moscow pulled out of a deal permitting protected passage for Ukrainian grain by means of the Black Sea.
Ukraine’s South Army Command stated that not less than two civilians have been injured and that port infrastructure on the Danube River had been hit within the assault, which lasted greater than three hours and concerned greater than two dozen drones. Ukraine’s Air Power stated it shot down 22 out of 25 assault drones and the State Emergency Service posted pictures of firefighters within the Odesa area attempting to extinguish a blaze.
The officers didn’t specify the place precisely the strikes landed however native Ukrainian media reported explosions within the port metropolis of Reni on the Danube, simply throughout the water from Romania.
Andriy Yermak, the top of the Ukrainian president’s workplace, condemned the in a single day assault. In a press release on the Telegram messaging app, he accused Russian forces of concentrating on port infrastructure “within the hope of upsetting a meals disaster and famine on this planet.”
The Danube delta grew to become a right away different waterway for grain ships after Russia pulled out of the Black Sea grain settlement in July, threatening all ships shifting to and from Ukraine and resuming its blockade of main Ukrainian ports alongside the ocean, comparable to Odesa.
However Russia quickly started attacking the smaller ports on the Danube as effectively, bombing Ukrainian grain-loading services there. In mid-August, granaries and warehouses in Reni and Izmail, one other port on the river, have been broken on account of Russian assaults.
In an try and get exports shifting once more, Kyiv established a short lived hall hugging the western Black Coastline from Ukraine to Turkey, to permit passage for civilian ships which have been caught in Ukrainian ports since earlier than Russia’s full-scale invasion.
A handful of vessels have used the hall in latest weeks, and President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine stated on Saturday that two extra ships had efficiently navigated passage. He later hailed Odesa as “a port on which the lives of varied nations relies upon” in his in a single day handle, simply hours earlier than the newest strikes.
The assaults within the Odesa area got here amid worldwide efforts to revive the grain deal. Russia has been touting what it casts a substitute for the settlement, which was brokered by the United Nations and Turkey and helped stabilize meals costs internationally however which Moscow complained was carried out unfairly.
Exact particulars of the Russian proposal stay scant, however President Vladimir V. Putin is scheduled to debate the matter with Turkey’s chief, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, on Monday when the 2 leaders maintain bilateral talks within the Black Sea resort of Sochi.
Right here’s what else is going on within the battle:
Ukrainian officers stated a Russian strike had hit a residential constructing within the japanese city of Vuhledar on Saturday, killing a person and his spouse. The prosecutor basic’s workplace stated on Telegram that the couple’s 19-year-old daughter and one other resident of the city have been injured.
