Russia has claimed it repelled a wave of Ukrainian drone and missile strikes on Sunday, a day after it launched the most important drone assault on Kyiv because the begin of President Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion final 12 months.
The Russian defence ministry stated anti-aircraft defences on Sunday morning shot down a complete of 24 Ukrainian drones on the outskirts of Moscow, in addition to within the areas of Tula, Kaluga, Smolensk and Bryansk to the capital’s south and west.
Russia additionally stated it downed two S-200 air defence missiles that had been refitted to strike floor targets as they flew over the Sea of Azov to Ukraine’s south-east.
The alleged assault got here a day after Russia carried out an enormous, six-hour drone strike on Kyiv that Ukraine fears is the beginning of a winter marketing campaign aimed toward destroying the nation’s energy and power infrastructure.
Ukraine’s air power stated it downed 74 of 75 Iranian-made Shahed kamikaze drones over Kyiv and the central areas of Sumy, Dnipropetrovsk, Zaporizhzhia, Mykolayiv and Kirovohrad, together with 66 launched on the capital within the early hours of Saturday morning.
The Russian assault wounded 5 folks and left 200 buildings, together with 77 residential ones, with out energy, Ukrainian officers stated.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy criticised the Russian management for ordering the drone strike on Saturday, when Kyiv commemorated the ninetieth anniversary of the genocidal Holodomor famine that killed greater than 3mn folks in Soviet Ukraine within the Nineteen Thirties.
“On this present day of remembrance, such a terrorist assault signifies that Putin is proud to comply with the best killers of the twentieth century. If he might prepare one other Holodomor for Ukraine, he would do it,” Zelenskyy stated.
Ukraine on Sunday didn’t touch upon the Russian claims of a drone assault, which, if confirmed, could be the biggest try by Kyiv to hit Moscow in a number of months.
The Russian capital has come below common drone strikes this 12 months, damaging residential buildings, disrupting airports and even exploding over the Kremlin. Ukrainian officers haven’t claimed accountability for the strikes however usually make cryptic feedback hinting at Kyiv’s involvement, utilizing domestically made drones to conduct the assaults.
Analysts have described the Ukrainian strikes as an try to deliver the realities of the conflict residence to a largely complacent Russian inhabitants and expose gaps in Russia’s air defences.
Russian information companies stated Moscow’s Vnukovo and Domodedovo airports briefly shut down within the early hours of Sunday morning earlier than resuming flights.
Sergei Sobyanin, Moscow’s mayor, stated preliminary data steered there have been “no casualties or severe injury” after the “mass drone strike”.
Regional governor Alexei Dyumin stated one particular person was injured in Tula after one of many drones crashed right into a 12-storey residential constructing and broken three residences, giving one particular person a light-weight laceration wound from the damaged glass. No different casualties had been reported.
Mash, a media outlet with shut ties to Russian legislation enforcement, stated the Ukrainian drones gave the impression to be a brand new mannequin styled after the Shaheds equipped by Iran. Earlier assaults on Moscow have used the Ukrainian drone producer Ukrjet’s UJ-22 drone and the Beaver drone, prominently featured in a crowdfunding marketing campaign by Ukrainian activists.
Extra reporting by Roman Olearchyk in Kyiv