Russian forces carried out at least four strikes on the Khortytsia liquor plant in Zaporizhzhia, setting off a fire that burned for at least three hours, NV Business reported, citing the press service of Global Spirits, the company that owns the plant.
The company said the plant cannot be restored. Part of its output burned completely, while the rest melted and must be discarded.
Global Spirits estimated the losses at three to four million bottles on which excise tax had already been paid. The average cost per unit is 100 hryvnias (about $2.2). More than 500 people worked at the plant, which produced vodka under the Khortytsia, Morosha, Pervak, Medova, Pshenichnaya Sleza and Gold Ukraine brands.
Ivan Fedorov, head of the Zaporizhzhia regional military administration, published a photo of the burning building and said production facilities of one enterprise had been damaged, without naming it. No one was injured in the fire.
Earlier, on the night of July 19, a Russian strike destroyed Global Spirits' main finished-goods warehouse near Kyiv, causing more than 100 million hryvnias in damage.
Global Spirits is headquartered in New York. Its founder is Ukrainian businessman Yevhen Chernyak. In Russia, the company's assets were nationalized, and a court sentenced Chernyak in absentia to 14 years in a penal colony on charges of financing the Armed Forces of Ukraine.