From overnight Saturday into Sunday, the Russian military carried out a “megastrike,” reportedly with 1,300 drones, including 200 that were jet powered, against Ukrainian rail and other logistics infrastructure. The barrage continued to target the Odessa and Mykolaiv (Nikolayev) Regions in southern Ukraine, where the Russians have been destroying the routes by which Ukraine imports munitions from the Black Sea and Romania. What was new was the direction of the drone barrage against small targets like gas stations, small warehouses, locomotives, and substations deep into Western Ukraine. According to a statement issued on Sunday by the Russian Defense Ministry, targets besides logistics and power facilities in Mykolaiv and Odessa cities included “railway infrastructure facilities in western regions of Ukraine providing transport of military cargo from European countries.” The destruction of gas stations and locomotives replicates what Russian forces have already done in eastern and southern Ukraine to disrupt Ukrainian military logistics.

Making headlines was a New York Times report claiming that a Russian drone nearly hit two passenger trains near the Polish border, a diplomatic train carrying European diplomats among whose passengers was Boris Johnson, and a regular passenger train which counted former CIA Director Gen. David Petraeus among its passengers. “This is the act of a truly barbaric leader trying to terrorize Ukrainian civilians,” Petraeus told the Times in a telephone interview on Sunday.

The drone hit the locomotive of a train passing next to Petraeus’s train, while the train carrying Boris Johnson had departed the station ahead of schedule, according to Ukrainian railway officials cited by the Times. According to Der Spiegel, other passengers traveling on the same train with Johnson included Günter Sautter, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s advisor on foreign and security policy, along with national security advisors from other European countries, members of the Bundestag, diplomats, and academics, all of whom had attended the 22nd annual YES international security conference in Kiev, sponsored by Ukrainian billionaire Victor Pinchuk.

On Monday, AFP asked Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov about the attack on the railway close to the Polish border. “If I understand correctly, we are talking about the territory of Ukraine,” he said. “Our military is carrying out its tasks throughout the territory of Ukraine and continues to do so and will continue to do so.”