A Russian drone strike on a railway station close to the Poland border has hit a passenger train on the Kyiv-Warsaw route, after Western officials travelling through the same station were placed under heightened security risk.
The drone struck the locomotive of a PKP Intercity passenger train at Yahodyn railway station in Ukraine's Volyn region. The station lies approximately 2 kilometers from the Poland border crossing.
The train was carrying 206 passengers from Kyiv to Warsaw. All had left the train before the strike after a monitoring team warned the crew of the approaching threat. The evacuation order came 'just 15 minutes' before the drone attack, according to the account provided by Ukrainian authorities. No one was injured and no casualties were reported.
Ukrainian authorities said the incident took place as senior Western figures were using diplomatic rail services through Yahodyn. Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and other Western officials had been at the station shortly beforehand on a separate diplomatic train returning from a conference in Kyiv.
Former Central Intelligence Agency director David Petraeus was aboard another train at Yahodyn station when the drone struck. Security advisers from several EU member states and former European leaders, including former Swedish Prime Minister Carl Bildt, were also on a diplomatic train at Yagodyn station.
Ukrzaliznytsia, Ukraine's state railway company, said 'quite possibly, the target of this drone could have been the diplomatic train.' The company did not establish whether Russian forces knew that the diplomatic train was present, or whether it was the intended target.
Russia said it had struck 'railway infrastructure' in western Ukraine. The drone was described as jet-propelled. The available information does not establish whether the attack was intended to threaten NATO territory.
Johnson said: 'I don't know what warped logic drove Putin to blow up a stationary Ukrainian locomotive on the Polish border this morning.'
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the train attack had been intentional. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha described the strikes as 'Putin's terror "knocking" directly on the doors of the EU and Nato.'
Poland's minister said one drone hit the Dorusk-Yodyn border area and another struck the passenger train. Ukrainian and Polish authorities have both confirmed that the strike occurred. There were no Polish citizens among the passengers on the train that was hit.
The Kyiv conference from which the officials were returning was the YES, or Yalta European Strategy, conference. The annual event brings together leaders and experts from politics, business, security and mass media.
With Ukrainian airspace closed, rail connections to neighbouring Poland have become a primary route out of the war-torn nation. The line between Kyiv and Warsaw therefore carries civilian travellers as well as visiting officials using diplomatic rail transport.
The strike also follows an earlier attack on rail passengers. In January, a Russian strike on a crowded passenger train in the north-eastern Kharkiv region left five people dead.
The Yahodyn attack caused no reported loss of life because the warning reached the crew in time. Its proximity to the border and the presence of Western officials give the incident wider diplomatic significance, even as Russia's purpose and knowledge of the trains at the station remain unknown.
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