Updated ,first published
London: Ukraine has launched new attacks on Russia’s largest online retailer, Wildberries, in a sign of its capacity to send explosive drones into enemy territory amid upheaval in the Ukrainian military after public protests about the war.
The drones reached two of the retailer’s major warehouses in Krasnodar and Nevinnomyssk, in southern Russia to the east of Crimea, and led to flames shooting skyward in dramatic explosions that were caught on video and seen on social media.
The attacks came at a fractious time in Ukraine after some members of the public gathered on the streets of Kyiv to express their concern after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky sacked the popular defence minister, Mykhailo Fedorov.
Zelensky moved again this week to try to end disunity in the military by removing the country’s commander-in-chief, Oleksandr Syrskyi, a general who divided opinion because of concern at the mounting deaths among Ukrainian soldiers from his strategy of inflicting maximum casualties on Russia.
Zelensky chose Mykhailo Drapatyi, 43, to replace Syrskyi, 60, in the biggest shake-up of Ukraine’s military leadership since Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022.
“It is important that all components of our Armed Forces continue to function in complete coordination,” the president said on X on Wednesday (about 7.30pm, AEST).
Fedorov was seen as a reformer who favoured a “drone first” approach to the war, relying on innovation and technology to minimise the deaths and casualties for Ukrainian volunteers at the front, leading to concern at his sudden removal.
The rise of Drapatyi to the top military post has won favour with some observers given his record of strong campaigns against Russian forces.
In a video shared widely on social media, Ukrainians hailed Drapatyi as the commander of a tank that broke through enemy fortifications in Mariupol in 2014, a symbolic moment early in the war against Russian forces.
Drapatyi said his plans included new operations behind enemy lines.
“The President of Ukraine has set clear objectives for us: to continue and intensify offensive operations in all domains, to plan new operations behind enemy lines, to develop our military and its technologies, and to build up the capabilities of the Armed Forces of Ukraine,” he said on Facebook.
Wildberries head Tatyana Kim confirmed on Wednesday (Russia time) that the warehouses in Krasnodar and Nevinnomyssk had been attacked. Social media footage, verified by Reuters, showed a huge plume of smoke rising into the air in Krasnodar.
Local authorities said one worker had been killed in another southern city, Armavir, when drone debris fell on one of the enterprises.
Krasnodar regional governor Veniamin Kondratiev said 10 people had been wounded in an attack on a storage complex. Drone debris has damaged two high-rise apartments in Krasnodar, where no one was injured.
Authorities said a helicopter would be deployed to tackle the fire at the warehouse in Krasnodar. More than a hundred people have been engaged in efforts to combat the fire.
A strike by Ukrainian drones on Saturday killed eight workers, sparked fires and disrupted operations at Wildberries.
“There are no words to describe all the feelings and emotions caused by the attacks on ordinary people, on our employees, on all of us who are simply doing our jobs,” Kim said in a post on the Telegram messaging app.
Wildberries started as an online shop reselling apparel from European catalogues. It has since expanded its product range and evolved into a marketplace that includes third-party vendors. It did not comment on the scale of the damage.
In a separate development, Russia is no longer willing to return some occupied territories to Ukraine as part of any deal to end the war and plans to retain them as buffer zones, according to people close to the Kremlin.
Russian President Vladimir Putin remains committed to taking full control of Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region by force and would now retain areas of Sumy and Kharkiv regions near the border with Russia as buffer zones, three people said, asking not to be identified discussing sensitive issues.
Putin had abandoned territorial concessions because Russia viewed increasingly confrontational statements from the US as evidence that informal understandings reached at his Alaska summit with US President Donald Trump had collapsed, the people said.
With Reuters, Bloomberg
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David Crowe is Europe correspondent for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.Connect via X or email.