Russia keeps striking the border crossings on Ukraine's western frontier with NATO member Romania and with Moldova, far from any front line. It has hit at least five of them in Odesa Oblast since late August, killing two civilians at one, State Border Guard Service Spokesperson Andrii Demchenko said, according to Zmina.

The crossings sit on Ukraine's borders with Moldova and with NATO member Romania, far to the west, and they carry the civilian traffic and the logistics that a country at war depends on. Hitting them disrupts supply and exit routes, and it pushes the strikes up against the alliance's edge. Drones have already crossed from these attacks into Moldovan and Romanian airspace.

Drones hit crossings far from the front

Four of the struck crossings are on the Moldovan border, and one is on the Romanian border, all in Odesa Oblast. The first came overnight on 20 August, and Russian forces hit several more Moldovan-border sites over the following days, mostly with strike drones.

Among them was the Vynohradivka crossing, hit by a Shahed drone overnight on 24-25 August. On the Romanian border, the Orlivka ferry crossing over the Danube was attacked twice in the first week of September, according to the State Border Guard Service.

A strike on Starokozache kills two

The deadliest hit came overnight on 9 September at the Starokozache crossing on the Moldovan border. Russian drones struck the checkpoint and the ground around it, killing two civilians and injuring three, and setting vehicles alight, Novyny.Live reports.

Border guards had already halted crossings and moved people away from the checkpoint to avoid a strike on a crowd, Demchenko said.

The attacks edge toward NATO

Demchenko said Russia most likely wants to disrupt logistics, but he called the strikes an act of terrorism because they hit places the attackers know are full of people.

“By striking territory where they know full well that people are present, it constitutes an act of terrorism, because they are deliberately targeting those locations,” he added.

The campaign is also spilling across borders: during the Starokozache attack, a drone entered Moldova's airspace and flew toward Romania, where Spanish F/A-18 jets on NATO air-policing duty were scrambled.