Key facts
- Four people, including two medical personnel, were killed in a Ukrainian strike on Russia's Belgorod region.
- The victims in Shebekino included a doctor, a medic, and a married couple.
- Three people were injured in the Belgorod attack.
- Three civilians died in drone strikes in three separate districts of Ukraine's Donetsk Region.
A Ukrainian strike on Thursday killed four people, including two medical personnel, in Russia's border region of Belgorod, officials said. The region's official headquarters, posting on Telegram, said the dead in Shebekino, just across the border from Ukraine, included a doctor, a medic, and a married couple. Three people were injured.
Meanwhile, the head of Russian-controlled parts of eastern Ukraine's Donetsk Region said three civilians died in drone strikes in three separate districts of the region.
Earlier reports from August 9 indicated five people died in a Ukrainian overnight drone attack on the city of Belgorod, with the regional crisis centre stating three were killed and 25 injured, a toll that later rose to five. Russia’s Defence Ministry claimed to have destroyed over 150 Ukrainian drones over European Russia, Crimea, the Black Sea, and the Sea of Azov. In Novorossiysk, drone debris fell on two facilities, causing damage to three residential buildings and injuring one person. In the Bashkortostan region, a Ukrainian drone struck a building under construction and a crane in Ufa.
On August 17, at least seven people were reported killed and four wounded in Ukrainian missile and drone attacks on Russia. Acting Belgorod Governor Alexander Shuvaev stated six people were killed and four wounded, including a 14-year-old, in an attack on Koloskovo village. A separate Ukrainian drone attack killed a woman in Russia’s southern region of Astrakhan, hitting an industrial facility. Concurrently, Russian forces launched missile and drone attacks across Ukraine, killing at least four people and wounding 19. Two people were killed and four injured in a Russian attack on Zaporizhia, two were killed and one wounded in shelling on Sumy, five were injured in Dnipropetrovsk, four were injured in Kharkiv, and five were injured in Kherson. A Russian attack targeted port infrastructure in Izmail, damaging a civilian vessel.
These attacks followed a day of reciprocal missile and drone strikes that killed 19 people in both countries. With front-line fighting stalled, both nations have intensified missile attacks, leading to the highest civilian death toll since the early months of the war in 2022. Russia has conducted near-daily attacks since February 2022, recently increasing its use of ballistic missiles amid Ukraine's air defense shortages. Ukraine has targeted warehouses of Russia's largest online retailer, Wildberries, claiming the company sells components for Russian drones and outfits Russian soldiers. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy stated these attacks, along with those on oil refineries, aim to undermine Russia's war economy. In July, 437 civilians were killed in Ukraine, the highest monthly toll since May 2022, while Russian authorities reported 79 civilians killed in Ukrainian attacks.