A Russian drone struck a train at Yahodyn, near Ukraine’s border with Poland, shortly after former British prime minister Boris Johnson and senior European security officials had passed along the same line, the Daily Mirror and Hiru News reported, citing the BBC.
No casualties were reported. The strike hit the train’s engine, and Ukrainian authorities said all passengers had already been evacuated.
Johnson and other European national security advisers, including the United Kingdom’s Jonathan Powell, had travelled the same route on a different train while returning from a conference in Kyiv.
Russia said it had struck “railway infrastructure” in western Ukraine. Ukraine’s state railway operator Ukrzaliznytsia suggested the timing may not have been coincidental.
The location
Yahodyn sits on the Ukrainian side of the border crossing with Poland and is one of the main rail entry points from the European Union. Western Ukraine’s rail network is the principal route by which foreign officials and aid reach Kyiv, since commercial air traffic remains suspended — which is why visiting delegations travel by train and why the line has strategic value.
The strike follows a pattern of Russian attacks close to NATO territory: Hiru News reported a separate Russian strike on a truck near the Polish border days earlier, and Poland has repeatedly scrambled aircraft during long-range attacks on western Ukraine.
Not reported
Neither outlet gives the time of the strike, the number of passengers who had been aboard, how long the line was closed, or the gap between the two trains passing the same point. Neither states whether Ukraine has attributed the attack to deliberate targeting of the delegation’s route, beyond Ukrzaliznytsia’s suggestion, and neither reports any response from the British government or from NATO.
