Two Trains Derail In Russia In Separate Incidents One Driver Dead

Two trains in separate parts of Russia's western Leningrad region derailed early Sunday, leaving a train driver dead and disrupting railway traffic, the region's governor said.

The incidents came hours after an explosive device detonated on a section of rail track in Russia's western Oryol region late Saturday, killing three Russian national guard officers.

A source in Ukraine's military intelligence agency on Sunday claimed responsibility for two of the attacks, but did not claim responsiblity for the derailment that killed the driver.

The sabotage incidents are the latest to rock Russia's vast railway system, which Kyiv says Moscow uses to deliver troops and fuel to its army fighting in Ukraine.

"Recovery efforts are under way following the derailment of a single diesel locomotive near Semrino station in Leningrad's Gatchina district," the governor of Russia's Leningrad region, Alexander Drozdenko, said on Telegram.

"The train driver was killed. He was trapped in the cabin and died in an ambulance after being unblocked," he added.

An unverified video posted on social media appeared to show a train car lying on its side several metres from the track, its undercarriage torn off.

A freight train carrying 15 empty tank cars also derailed on a section of track further south earlier in the day, between the villages of Stroganovo and Mshinskaya, but left no casualties, Drozdenko said.

A source in Ukraine's GUR military intelligence told AFP the tanks were "destroyed along with their fuel".

The source said Ukraine had targeted "critically important logistical links in supplying the occupying forces in the Kharkiv and Sumy directions."

"As a result of the destruction of the railway infrastructure in these areas, the Russians will experience significant logistical difficulties," it said.

Russia's railway network has been repeatedly rocked by derailments, blasts and fires that authorities blame on Ukrainian sabotage.

Kyiv does not typically claim responsibility but often cheers such attacks on, arguing Russia has brazenly uses its train network for military purposes since launching its offensive in February 2022.

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