Facilities that produce engines and munitions were targeted, the Defense Ministry says
FILE PHOTO. © Sputnik
The Russian Air Force has struck rocket factories in eastern Ukraine and destroyed a mercenary headquarters, the Defense Ministry has said.
The ministry said in its daily briefing on Friday that a missile engine factory in Pavlograd was hit, along with three shop floors of the Kommunar factory in Kharkov that made munitions for multiple-rocket launchers.
Russian aircraft and ground forces also struck five command centers and carried out a missile strike on the headquarters of “one of the foreign mercenary units” near the southern city of Nikolaev, the ministry said.
It added that nine rockets fired from US-made M142 HIMARS launchers and three fired from the BM-27 Uragan system were destroyed mid-air in Russia’s Kherson Region.
Moscow stepped up strikes on Kiev and elsewhere in Ukraine last month, hitting thermal power plants and power lines, among other targets.
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President Vladimir Putin said the intensification of the strikes is retaliation for Kiev’s “terrorist attacks” on Russia soil, including a truck bombing that damaged the strategic bridge that connects the Crimean Peninsula with the Russian mainland.