The Ukrainian military claims to have attacked and destroyed a Russian submarine while it was docked in a port on the occupied Crimean peninsula.
The Rostov-on-Don, a kilo-class attack submarine launched in 2014, sank after being hit by a missile attack off the port city of Sevastopol on Friday, Ukraine’s General Staff said in a statement.
It was reportedly one of four submarines operated by the Russian Black Sea Fleet capable of launching Kalibr cruise missiles. The Russian Defense Ministry did not comment.
Officials in Kiev said the attack also destroyed four S-400 air defense systems protecting the peninsula, which Russia illegally annexed in 2014.
UK intelligence officials noted last September that the Rostov-on-Don “likely suffered catastrophic damage” in a missile attack while undergoing maintenance at a Sevastopol shipyard.
The Ukrainian military said Russia later repaired the ship and recently tested its capabilities near Sevastopol. The ship was worth $300 million (£233 million), they added.
“The destruction of Rostov-on-Don proves once again that there is no safe place for the Russian fleet in the Ukrainian territorial waters of the Black Sea,” the General Staff in Kiev said in a statement on Saturday.
It marks the latest attack on Russian naval forces in Sevastopol in recent months. In March alone, Ukraine said it struck two landing ships and a patrol vessel in the port city.
Since Russia launched its unprovoked invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, it has suffered several major naval setbacks. Ukraine claims to have seriously damaged or sunk at least 15 warships, including the Flagship of the Black Sea Fleet, the Moskva.
Last week, the Ukrainian military said that Moscow had been forced to withdraw all its naval assets from the Sea of Azov – a body of water linked to the Black Sea – due to repeated attacks on its ships.
And Russia’s internal security service, the FSB, recently said it foiled a Ukrainian plot to destroy its last remaining aircraft carrier, the Admiral Kuznetsov. The ship, launched in 1985, has been undergoing repairs since 2018.
Meanwhile, officials in Kiev said Ukrainian drones were targeting a major airfield and oil depots in Russia.
The attack targeted the Morozovsk airfield, where guided bombs that recently destroyed Ukrainian cities are stored.
Online images purportedly from the base showed powerful explosions and large fires, following what appear to be several attacks on fuel or ammunition depots. Russia said many of the drones used were shot down, but local authorities declared a state of emergency around the air base.
Oil storage facilities were also targeted in the Rostov, Kursk and Belgorod regions.
The attacks come after Russia dropped more than 600 guided aerial bombs on Ukraine in a week, according to President Volodymyr Zelensky.
He said it was crucial that Ukraine stopped Russian planes from dropping the munitions and said attacking airfields in Russia to do so was “quite fair.”
Ukraine’s allies have previously been reluctant to allow it to attack inside Russia using Western weapons, although the US recently granted Kiev permission to attack some targets along the border.
Earlier this week, Lithuania’s foreign minister said the first deliveries of F-16 fighter jets had arrived in Ukraine. Long promised by Kiev’s NATO allies, President Zelenky sees the planes as central to his country’s air defense plans.
The Times newspaper reported that six jets donated by the Netherlands had arrived in the country, but Dutch defense officials declined to comment when approached by the BBC earlier this week.
Officials in Kiev also hope the jets can help halt Russian momentum on the front lines. Moscow’s forces have been making incremental gains in the east of the country for several weeks.
