Russia hits Ukraine’s Danube port in attack condemned by Romania

KYIV: Russian drones targeted Ukraine’s southern Odesa region in the early hours of Sunday, with Moscow hitting a Danube port on the border with NATO member Romania in an attack condemned by Bucharest.

Moscow has hit Ukrainian port infrastructure on the Black Sea and on the Danube for weeks, since exiting a key deal that allowed the safe passage of ships carrying grain. The attack came on the eve of a summit in Russia between Vladimir Putin and Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who hopes to revive the grain deal. President Volodymyr Zelensky said Sunday that he discussed “ways to ensure the functioning” of a maritime corridor set up by Kyiv to ensure safe navigation with France’s Emmanuel Macron.

The Odesa region attacks also came as Kyiv has claimed some successes in its counter-offensive on the southern front this week.

Ukraine said Russia had hit the Odesa region with a barrage of Iranian-made Shahed drones, saying it downed 22 of them. But Kyiv also said that some of the drones hit the Danube area, saying that at least two people were wounded in attacks on “civilian industrial” infrastructure.

The Russian army said it had targeted “fuel storage” facilities in the Ukrainian port of Reni, which lies on the Danube river that separates Ukraine from Romania. Moscow has targeted the Danube ports of Reni and Ismail — both near Romania and across the war-torn country from fighting hotspots — several times over the last few weeks. Reni — which also lies close to Moldova — is a sea and river port and important transport hub. Bucharest’s defence ministry said the attacks were “unjustified and in deep contradiction with the rules of international humanitarian law”.

It also stressed that the Moscow drone attacks did not “generate any direct military threat to the national territory or territorial waters of Romania.”

Neighbouring Moldova called the attack “brutal.” “Russia must be held accountable for every piece of infrastructure destroyed,” Chisinau’s pro-EU President Maia Sandu said on social media.