ISTANBUL
Ukraine said on Friday that Russia launched overnight airstrikes on several regions of the war-torn country, particularly targeting energy infrastructure.
A statement by the country’s Energy Ministry said on Telegram that the attack consisted of missile and drone strikes, and that rescuers and energy workers are currently working to eliminate the consequences of the attacks and stabilize the situation as soon as possible.
Separately, Ukraine’s power grid operator Ukrenergo noted that the situation is difficult, particularly in the northeastern Sumy and northern Chernihiv regions, where it said damage to energy facilities is “most significant.”
Meanwhile, Ukrainian private energy provider DTEK declared that the operations of a number of its gas production facilities in the central Poltava region were halted.
Poltava Governor Volodymyr Kohut announced that no one was injured in his region due to the attack, while civil infrastructure facilities were damaged.
In a later statement, Sergii Koretskyi, the CEO of Ukraine's national oil and gas company Naftogaz, defined the attack as the largest on the company's gas production facilities since the start of the Russia-Ukraine war in February 2022.
A corresponding statement claimed that Naftogaz facilities in the Kharkiv and Poltava regions were targeted by 35 missiles and 60 drones, of which some were not intercepted by the country's air defenses.
“As a result of this attack, a significant portion of our facilities has been damaged. Some of the destruction is critical," Koretskyi was quoted as saying, defining the attack as a "deliberate act of terror."
Elsewhere, the Ukrainian Air Force claimed that its air defenses shot down 303 out of 381 drones, as well as 17 out of 35 various types of missiles, launched by Russia overnight.
The Russian Defense Ministry said in a later statement that it launched a “massive” strike overnight against facilities of Ukraine's military-industrial complex, as well as gas and energy infrastructure supporting them.