Ukraine’s State Border Service said it has observed a spike in Russian strikes against the Chernihiv region.

The northern region borders Russia and Belarus and was briefly besieged in early 2022. It has remained a concern amid the risk of a possible advance from Belarus and is now facing regular blackouts after recent Russian strikes on the energy grid.

Andriy Demchenko, a spokesman for the State Border Service, said on national television on Sunday that Russia has shifted its focus to the Chernihiv region, whereas earlier strikes were concentrated on the northeastern Sumy and Kharkiv regions.

“The attack is not decreasing – the enemy, on the contrary, is increasing the number of its strikes by various means on the border of Ukraine within the Chernihiv, Sumy, and Kharkiv regions,” Demchenko said, according to state media Ukrinform.

“Recently, the number of attack on the Chernihiv region has significantly increased, because before that, most of the shelling occurred precisely within the Sumy and Kharkiv regions,” he added.

But as of September, Demchenko said Russia has no spare troops to launch a new invasion from Belarus, according to local media UNN.

On Sunday, Demchenko said that this year, Russian forces have increasingly relied on drones, including fiber-optic models that are resistant to jamming and inexpensive, mass-produced first-person-view (FPV) drones.

While long-range kamikaze drones, such as the Iranian-designed Shaheds and their Russian Geran variants, remain Moscow’s weapon of choice for striking regions far from the front, including Chernihiv, Demchenko did not say whether the increase also applies to other types of weapons.

Demchenko also did not provide precise data on the number of strikes registered.

Uptick in strikes on Chernihiv region

However, Kyiv Post notes an uptick in reported strikes on Chernihiv in recent weeks.

In September, an international demining mission, funded by Denmark, was targeted by a Russian missile while working in the region. Later that same month, police body-cam footage reportedly showed a so-called “double-tap” strike targeting responders while police and rescue teams were attending the scene.

A few days later, a Russian missile ripped through a military training center in the region.

Occasional blackouts were reported later in September as Russia began targeting the energy grid, sparking criticisms over local authorities’ preparedness.

At the start of October, blackouts and water disruptions were reported across the region following more Russian strikes, with a report around a week later noting that over 61,000 were left without power after Shahed drones hit power facilities at the city of Pryluky in the region.

Railway infrastructure between the Sumy and Chernihiv regions was also targeted.

Later the same month, Kyiv Post documented at least three more strikes on Chernihiv’s energy facilities – one on Oct. 11 that killed a repair worker, another between Oct. 19 and Oct. 20 that targeted multiple facilities across the region, and one more on Oct. 21 that cut off power and water to locals.