"Massive" Ukrainian drone and missile attack on Russian port of Novorossiysk damaged two major grain export terminals and hit Russia's last major naval base on the Black Sea, reports said.
In the attack during the night, three people died, including an eight-year-old child, while another 24 people were injured, local officials announced.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that Kiev used missiles, aircraft and naval drones in a "unified operation" to attack the Russian base, but did not mention that grain export terminals were also hit.
The Ukrainian military later announced that four Russian warships had been hit, including two frigates. Russia has not commented on these claims.
"The occupation fleet and all the infrastructure that supports it will not be safe as long as Russian aggression continues," Zelensky wrote on social media.
Most of Russia's Black Sea Fleet is now stationed in Novorossiysk, one of Russia's largest ports, after Ukrainian attacks forced it to leave its former home base in Sevastopol, Crimea, which is under Russian occupation.
The attack followed an intensification of the exchange of blows in the Black Sea this summer, after a period of relative calm.
In an interview with CNN, Zelensky said that Ukraine needs ten percent of the current US stockpile of interceptor missiles to stop any Russian ballistic missile attacks.
He added that five percent of those stocks would be enough for Ukraine to withstand the coming winter.
"This year we have two and a half times less interceptors than we had in 2025," the Ukrainian president said.
"Russia has twice as many ballistic missiles per month as before."
One of the major grain trading companies confirmed to Russia's state news agency TASS that its terminal was hit in Wednesday's attack. The same was confirmed by another company in statements to Reuters and the Russian portal RBK.
The Russian Ministry of Agriculture announced on Wednesday that it is working to redirect cargo flows to ports on the Baltic and Caspian Seas, as well as to land routes. The ministry did not directly mention the Ukrainian attacks, but said it was "taking into account current logistical constraints."
During the night, according to reports, numerous explosions were heard from Novorossiysk while anti-aircraft defense shot down objects from the air.
A state of emergency was declared in the city on Wednesday after drones hit areas around the port and damaged pipelines, disrupting water supplies.
In another part of the region, one person died from debris from a downed drone, announced the governor of the Krasnodar region, Veniamin Kondratiev.
He added that during the night in different parts of the Krasnodar region, an attack was carried out by "several hundred drones", during which dozens of buildings, including residential buildings and houses, were damaged.
Source: BBC
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