Ukraine war briefing: Drones blast Russian plant for missile and fighter jet chips

The Guardian

22-05-2025

Ukraine's military said 10 of its drones hit the Bolkhovsky semiconductor plant, a supplier in the Oryol region to Russian fighter jet and missile makers. Videos online and Nasa satellite fire monitoring supported the claim. 'This is one of the leading enterprises in the Russian Federation in the field of development and production of semiconductor devices and components,' said the Ukrainian military, adding that parts from the plant went into Iskander and Kinzhal missiles.
A Russian strike on a military training site in north-eastern Ukraine killed six soldiers and wounded at least 10 others, the Ukrainian national guard said on Wednesday. Russia's defence ministry confirmed a ballistic missile attack on the 'training camp' for Ukrainian special forces. Ukraine's national guard said: 'An internal investigation into the incident is under way. The commander of the military unit has been suspended, and the necessary information has been passed on to law enforcement agencies.' Commanders on both sides have been censured during the war after presiding over military assemblies for training, parades and presentations that have come under enemy attack, resulting in casualties.
Russia said more than 370 Ukrainian drones attacked across the border on Wednesday, including 27 aimed at Moscow, the capital, where airports had to be temporarily shut down.
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said in his nightly video address that the heaviest frontline battles were around Pokrovsk, while Ukrainian forces remained active in two Russian regions along the border: Kursk and Belgorod. Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, visited the Kursk region on Tuesday. Russia's defence ministry said its forces were advancing at key points along the front, and pro-Russian war bloggers said Russia had penetrated Ukrainian lines between Pokrovsk and Kostiantynivka in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine. The battlefield accounts could not be independently verified.
Zelenskyy spoke on Wednesday with the Nato secretary general, Mark Rutte, about the need to put pressure on Russia: 'It is important that all decisions are coordinated. Then the sanctions will work. Without pressure on Moscow, a just peace cannot be achieved. Everyone understands this.'
Russian military intelligence (the GRU) is targeting organisations delivering assistance to Ukraine by hacking into cameras at crossings and railway stations and near military installations, as well as such tactics as phishing emails and stealing passwords, according to the UK's intelligence services and those of allies. Daniel Boffey writes that the unit involved – GRU Unit 26165, also known as APT 28 or Fancy Bear – has conducted the malicious cyber-campaign against public and private organisations in Nato states since 2022. In an advisory note, the UK's National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) – part of GCHQ – called on private companies involved in the delivery of aid to 'take immediate action to protect themselves'.
The Polish navy has chased a 'shadow fleet' oil tanker away from an undersea power cable connecting Poland to Sweden. Donald Tusk, the Polish prime minister, said on Wednesday that the ship was undertaking 'suspicious' activity and 'following a successful intervention by our military, the vessel left for one of the Russian ports'. The Polish defence minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz said an emergency meeting of Poland's Maritime Operations Command would be held on Thursday.
Finland has said it expects Russia to further build up troops along their shared border when the war in Ukraine ends, writes Miranda Bryant, after reports that Moscow had strengthened its military bases near the Nato frontier. Maj Gen Sami Nurmi of the Finnish defence forces said the military was following Moscow's manoeuvring 'very closely' in order to 'prepare for the worst'. The Finnish border guard announced on Wednesday it had completed the first 35km of a planned 200km fence on its eastern border with Russia, which has been closed for more than a year after Helsinki accused Moscow of directing asylum seekers to Finland in a 'hybrid operation'. The fence also uses cameras and sensors to distinguish between people and animals crossing.