(Reuters) – Ukraine’s intelligence chief Kyrylo Budanov said recent attacks on Russian airfields had destroyed two TU-22 bombers and damaged two more bombers.
“Two were destroyed, two were damaged. Two can not be repaired,” Budanov said in a TV interview on Wednesday night for the Ukrainian service of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.
He said a fifth Russian aircarft could have been hit.
Russian officials reported drone attacks on military airfields Soltsy in the Novgorod region on Saturday and Shaykovka in the Kaluga region on Monday and said that one warplane was damaged during the first attack.
On Tuesday, British military intelligence said that Russia was likely to have lost a nuclear-capable TU-22M3 supersonic long-range bomber in the attack on Soltsy.
Budanov said that his intelligence agency was in direct contact with people who attacked the airfields.
“These were people who carried out certain tasks from the Russian territory,” he said.
A spokesperson for the Ukrainian intelligence said this week that the agency coordinated the attack on the Shaykovka airfield.
(Reporting by Maria Tsvetkova in New York; Editing by Michael Perry)
