KYIV (Reuters) -The Ukrainian military said it had carried out a high-precision strike on Thursday on a Russian command post in Maryino, in the Kursk region, where Ukrainian forces hold chunks of territory after a major incursion.
The Russian military said air defence units had downed four Ukrainian missiles in the region, and the regional governor said the strikes had damaged a high-rise apartment building and other buildings in an adjacent village.
Ukrainian forces remain in the Kursk region five months after sending troops across the border, though the Russian military says much of the lost territory has been recaptured.
“These strikes disrupt the ability of the Russian Federation to conduct terrorism against innocent Ukrainian civilians,” the Ukrainian military said in a statement via the Telegram messaging app.
Another post showed a video of what the military said was damage to a Russian base in Ivanovskoye, next to Maryino.
Reuters could not independently verify battlefield accounts from either side.
Kursk regional governor Alexander Khinshtein said the strike on Ivanovskoye had shattered windows in a multi-storey apartment building and in private homes. Also damaged were a school, a pharmacy and a shop.
A video showed work under way to repair damage to a facade.
Military officials in Kursk region later reported that air defence units had downed one more missile over Kursk region.
Russia’s Defence Ministry said its air defences had downed a series of drones late on Thursday targeting regions near the Ukrainian border, including two in Belgorod region, two in Bryansk region and one in Kursk region.
The governor of Oryol region, farther north, said four drones had been downed.
There were no reports of damage or casualties in the latest incidents.
(Reporting by Anastasiia Malenko and Ron Popeski; Editing by Toby Chopra, Kevin Liffey and Matthew Lewis)
