More than 300 workers were urgently evacuated today at a Russian Amazon logistics hub as it was hit in a Ukrainian drone attack.
It was the second Ozon online marketplace struck in two days as Vladimir Putin admitted Kyiv was damaging his economy with its latest onslaught.
This morning’s strike was in the southern city of Orenburg, about 800 miles from Ukraine.
The first targeted Ozon logistics centre in Chapayevsk, Samara region, was still ablaze 24 hours after it was hit on Saturday.
Meanwhile, Moscow has pulled its ambassador out of Britain after Putin claimed the concerted strikes on so-called ‘Russian Amazon’ Ozon and Wildberries facilities were helped on by ‘Western handlers’ like the UK.
Ambassador Andrey Kelin left his diplomatic posting on July 21 after seven years in the position, and the Kremlin has not submitted any candidates to the Foreign Office to replace him.
Without this replacement, diplomatic relations have effectively been downgraded between the two countries and fears have arisen of a total breakdown of communications between Moscow and London.
Relations between the UK and Russia took a dive last week after it emerged that British drones had been used by Ukraine to strike targets deep in the Russian mainland, prompting the embassy to threaten ‘consequences’.
A second ‘Russian Amazon’ Ozon facility was hit in two days this morning in Orenburg as 300 workers were evacuated
The first targeted Ozon logistics centre in Chapayevsk, Samara region, was still ablaze 24 hours after it was hit on Saturday
Meanwhile, Moscow has pulled its ambassador Andrey Kelin out of Britain, marking a distinct dive in diplomatic relations between the countries. No replacement has yet been put forward
Meanwhile, Ukraine believes Russia is planning to mobilise an additional 300,000 troops after parliamentary elections in September, President Volodymyr Zelensky said this morning.
He believes that these troops would be used in 2027 for the key goal of capturing the rest of Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region.
On the ground in Russia, another huge blaze engulfed Kolpino, in St. Petersburg, where a warehouse the size of a dozen football pitches – or 861,000 sq ft – was ignited.
The inferno mysteriously erupted without a drone alert or air raid warning amid suspicions of sabotage.
The latest fires engulfing Russia came after 16 civilians were killed and 130 wounded by Putin drones in a brutal shopping complex attack.
They died in a daytime strike on the largest shopping mall in Kryvyi Rih, Volodymyr Zelensky’s home city.
Overnight, his forces again hit civilians in a Shahed kamikaze drone attack on a private house in Kharkiv region, where eight civilians were injured, including a 74-year-old woman.
Separately, Russia staged a drone attack on a train from Zhytomyr to Odesa, carrying 593 passengers, including 15 children.
The train was halted, and passengers were urgently evacuated, preventing casualties.
Putin sought to justify such attacks on Ukraine, which have been branded war crimes for targeting civilians.
‘Of course, these strikes are effective,’ he said.
‘They are timely. And, of course, this helps our soldiers, our boys, our heroes on the front lines to solve the combat tasks facing them.’
With the Russian embassy in London missing its ambassador, it is now headed by the chargé d’affaires, a lower-ranking diplomat.
It is unclear whether this will be a permanent change, but the delay could mean that the Kremlin believes the UK no longer deserves top-level political representation and, at the very least, is a way to express severe displeasure without severing ties completely.
A Russian embassy spokesperson said Ambassador Kelin had previously made ‘considerable efforts to preserve contacts and channels of communication’.
They told The Sunday Times: ‘He left Britain in the hope that a more constructive and respectful dialogue could eventually be restored, should the UK reconsider its policies towards our country.’
Kelin made headlines in the past after promoting pro-Russian propaganda, denying a UK Foreign Office report that the poison from a dart frog had been used to kill the Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny.
Last year he also rejected the findings of an official investigation into the Salisbury poison attack which killed Dawn Sturgess in 2018 and insisted it was staged by the British government.
A mysterious huge blaze engulfed Kolpino, in St. Petersburg, where a warehouse the size of a dozen football pitches – or 861,000 sq ft – was ignited
The inferno erupted without a drone alert or air raid warning amid suspicions of sabotage
While the downgrade of diplomatic relations is usually announced publicly, Kelin’s departure was announced internally on June 11, a month before his departure, during a party at the embassy celebrating Russia Day.
Putin – speaking to his personal propagandist Pavel Zaburin – said his missile and drone onslaught helps to ‘disrupt the ability of Ukrainian forces to deliver equipment and ammunition’.
The 73-year-old dictator claimed he was responding to ‘yet another venture by the Kyiv regime and its Western handlers.’
They were planning to inflict a ‘strategic defeat on Russia….using massive missile strikes and UAVs against our civilian facilities and logistics’.
He appeared to be referring to the Ukrainian disabling of Wildberries and more recently Ozon, which Kyiv accuses of supplying his war machine.
‘The publicly stated goal was to destroy entire sectors of our country’s economy, undermine the unity of our people, and weaken the cohesion of Russian society,’ claimed Putin.
‘In short, the goal is to bring Russia to collapse.’
Putin, in an unusual admission, said Ukraine’s strikes on oil refineries and logistics hubs ‘are causing economic damage to our country and have led to losses’.
Overnight, Russia claimed to have shot down 328 Ukrainian drones.
Putin dismissed Ukrainian peace proposals as ‘exotic’.
‘We are always ready for a dialogue about peace, but only on the basis of the realities unfolding on the ground,’ he said.
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