Drone attack ignites blaze at energy plant in Russia’s Volgograd, governor says

July 31 (Reuters) – A drone attack set ablaze an energy facility and warehouses in Russia’s Volgograd region on Friday, injuring five, the regional governor, Andrei Bocharov, said, but stopped short of giving details of the facilities.

The region is home to a Lukoil-owned oil refinery. Five people are seeking medical help after the attacks, Bocharov added on Telegram.

Top online retailer Wildberries said in a Telegram statement that one of its logistic hubs in the city of Volgograd caught fire following the attack, but there were no injuries.

In the neighbouring southern region of Rostov, a woman was injured after a drone attack in the town of Gukovo, regional governor Yuri Slyusar said on the messaging app.

Ukraine has recently stepped up attacks on Wildberries facilities, as it keeps up strikes on energy facilities that have triggered a supply crisis across most of Russia.

Wildberries, with a few of its other warehouses hit as recently as Thursday, earlier said it had paid a second tranche of financial support to nearly 100,000 sellers whose goods were damaged.

Ukraine, with its own cities under constant Russian attack, says its strikes deep inside the neighbour are “long-range sanctions” designed to sap Moscow’s war-fighting capacity and force it to end the 4-1/2-year conflict.

(Reporting by Jekaterīna Golubkova in Tokyo; Editing by Christian Schmollinger and Clarence Fernandez)