Russian, Ukrainian forces trade barrage of attacks against civilian targets
Sept. 27 (UPI) -- Russian and Ukrainian forces traded attacks against scores of civilian targets overnight Tuesday, killing one person, injuring 18 and causing widespread damage.
At least nine Ukrainian provinces came under fire from Russian shelling and drones hundreds of times, according to authorities, while Moscow said Ukrainian forces fired more than 130 munitions at its Belgorod region bordering Ukraine.
In Zaporizhzhia, a 66-year-old man was killed in the village of Orikhiv and a 56-year-old man was injured after Russian forces fired more than 130 artillery rounds, according to Gov. Yurii Malashko.
Kherson Gov. Oleksandr Prokudin reported 119 strikes in the province had injured 12 people. Two men in Dnipropetrovsk, ages 44 and 68, were hospitalized after Russian forces targeted Nikopol with drones and artillery.
One person was injured in Orlivka in Donetsk, the provincial military administration said, while in Kharkiv man in his 60s was injured in Russian artillery strike against Vovchansk, according to Gov. Oleh Syniehubov.
Four other provinces -- Chernihiv, Luhansk, Mykolaiv and Sumy -- also came under attack, but no injures or deaths were reported.
Meanwhile, Russia accused Ukraine of striking 22 villages and towns in its Bolgorod region with artillery and kamikaze drones.
A woman was being treated in a hospital for a shrapnel wound to her head after her village came under fire.
"In the Valuisky district, the village of Dolgoye was shelled 20 times," the official TASS news agency quoted Bolgorod Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov as saying.
"One of the shells flew into the territory of a private house. As a result, a woman was injured -- she was taken to the central district hospital with a shrapnel wound in the head. The doctors are providing her with all necessary assistance.
"Four private houses were damaged in various ways: Windows were broken, facades and roofs were cut. In addition, two cars were damaged," Gladkov said.
Moscow said Ukrainian forces also attacked the village of Dolgoye three times with kamikaze drones, damaging a communication infrastructure facility. Seven artillery shells were fired at Dubrovka and 10 at Biryuch.
Five artillery and two mortar shells were fired at the village of Novaya Tavolzhanka In Shebekinsky district, damaging a power line, water tower and the outbuildings of a private house.
Power was cut to the village of Chervona-Dibrovka after it was shelled twice, but has since been restored, according to Gladkov, and 10 artillery shells were fired at the village of Bolshetroitskoye damaging four houses, three commercial building and a car.
The town of Shebekino was also shelled, damaging a private residence, and power in the Zadorozhny settlement was knocked out by shelling. Gladkov said power had since been restored.
In the Belgorod district, the village of Nekhoteyevka had six artillery shells incoming and a drone was downed over the village of Razumnoye. In Borisovsky district, a drone dropped five explosives on the outskirts of Lozovaya Rudka. In Volokonovsky district, six mortar shells hit the outskirts of Stariy.
In the Graivoronsky district, fixed-wing drones were downed in Sankovo and Gorkovsky.
"Fourteen mortar shells were fired on the outskirts of the Bairak settlement and 10 and three mortar shells on the outskirts of the villages of Bezymeno and Pochaevo, respectively," Gladkov said.
Novostroyevka-Vtoraya came under attack from mortar rounds three times, damaging properties, and seven mortar shells were fired at the village of Poroz damaging four homes.
Ukraine said it hit back with the Air Force of the Defense Forces of Ukraine launching 12 strikes on Russian troops, weapons and military equipment clusters in the past 24 hours as part of defensive operations in the east and south of Ukraine.
Offensive operations in the Melitopol and the Bakhmut sectors were ongoing, the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine wrote in a post on its Facebook page.
Elsewhere, British military intelligence reported Russia had deployed a new fighting force on its offensive line.
"Since mid-September 2023, Russia has highly likely committed elements of its new 25th Combined Arms Army to action for the first time. The formation started moving into Ukraine from late August 2023, " the Ministry of Defense wrote in an intelligence update.
"Units from two of 25 CAA's maneuver components, 67th Motor Rifle Division and 164th Separate Motor Rifle Brigade, are reported to be fighting on the front in a sector west of Severodonetsk and Kreminna, along the border between Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts."
But the ministry ruled out any new concerted Russian offensive as the force was being deployed piecemeal to shore up an "overstretched line."
