MOSCOW: Thick grey smoke was seen rising into the air on the outskirts of St. Petersburg on the first day of Russia’s annual economic forum there after an overnight Ukrainian drone attack, according to Reuters witnesses on Wednesday.
Ukrainian President Volodymry Zelensky said his drones ahd struck an oil terminal in St. Petersburg and Alexander Beglov, the governor of St. Petersburg, said that unspecified “infrastructure objects” had been hit in three districts of the city.
Russia downed 50 drones over the Leningrad region northwest of Moscow overnight and continues to repel the suspected Ukrainian attacks, Governor Alexander Drozdenko said on Wednesday, as a major annual economic forum was about to start.
The Leningrad region, home to crucial energy export infrastructure and a major oil refinery, is hosting the economic conference, President Vladimir Putin’s “Russian Davos,” in St. Petersburg from Wednesday.
The investment forum, the fifth since Russia sent troops into Ukraine in 2022, opens just hours after a deadly Russian drone and missile attack on Kyiv which Moscow said was in response to a deadly attack on a dormitory in Kremlin-controlled Luhansk.
