Russia says it struck data centres in major Ukrainian cities
The defence ministry's claim, carried by RIA, marks a new category of target beyond energy and shipping infrastructure.
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Map: Ukraine, marking Kyiv, Donetsk
Russia's defence ministry said it struck data centres in major Ukrainian cities, according to RIA. The ministry gave no details on casualties or damage.
The claim follows a warning from the same ministry that it would intensify strikes on Kyiv and other regions, a threat it tied to President Zelenskiy's pledge to keep hitting Russian oil refineries. Moscow mayor Sergei Sobyanin said Monday that 650 Ukrainian drones had targeted the Moscow region overnight, a sharp jump in scale from recent refinery and shipping attacks.
Zelenskiy said Saturday that Ukraine would continue to strike Russian refineries rather than civilian targets, and that Ukrainian forces had stabilised the front near Donetsk under an operation he calls Vivaldi. Russian strikes that day killed at least six people across Ukraine and damaged a bridge in Kyiv, with Moscow saying it would keep up what it called mass retaliatory strikes.
By naming data centres as a target, Russia is widening its list beyond energy and shipping infrastructure into digital and communications capacity, broadening the economic disruption it is willing to inflict on major Ukrainian cities even as both sides continue to trade retaliation pledges. The shift fits a pattern of intensifying strikes the defence ministry had already signalled, and there is no diplomatic mechanism in place to contain how far the target list keeps expanding.