Moscow, Russia:
Kiev carried out a major drone strike on the Russian city of Kazan, 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) from the border, on Saturday, the latest in a series of escalating air strikes in the nearly three-year conflict.
A drone crashed into an apartment building in Kazan, a city of more than 1.3 million people, damaging a skyscraper but leaving no casualties, local officials said.
While attacks on Russian territory have been rare so far, Kazan and the surrounding oil-rich region of Tatarstan have been targeted by Ukrainian drones before.
Such attacks are seen as embarrassing for Russia as the military offensive against Ukraine approaches three years.
“Today Kazan was hit by a huge drone attack,” Rustam Minnikhanov, the head of Tatarstan, said in a message on Telegram.
“While before industrial enterprises were attacked, now the enemy attacks civilians in the morning,” he added.
Videos on Russian social media networks showed drones hitting tall buildings and creating fireballs.
Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said two drones hit a 37-storey apartment building.
She said Ukraine had targeted an unspecified industrial facility but that it had suffered no damage.
Ukraine, which has carried out regular attacks on targets in Russia since the large-scale military offensive began in February 2022, did not immediately comment.
Russia's Rosaviatsia Civil Aviation Authority has temporarily closed Kazan International Airport, one of the country's busiest.
Some residents were evacuated, but authorities did not provide figures and all major public events in the area were canceled as a precaution.
In addition to the two drones that hit the apartment building, three drones were shot down and three were suppressed by air defense systems, Zakharova said.
In a post on Telegram, she said Kiev expressed its “anger over tangible military defeats on the peaceful people of Russia.”
The Russian Defense Ministry said on Saturday that the army has captured a new village near the important city of Kurakhove in eastern Ukraine, where Russian forces have made major advances in recent months.
The attack on Kazan comes a day after Russian attacks on the Ukrainian capital Kiev killed one person and wounded 13, and after five were killed in a Ukrainian attack on the Russian border region of Kursk, where troops have been on an offensive since August feed.
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