Ukraine drones kill at least four in Moscow region
At least four people have been killed, including three in the Moscow region, after Ukraine launched its biggest nighttime drone attack on the Russian capital in more than a year.
A fourth person was killed in the Belgorod region on the border with northeastern Ukraine, local officials said on Sunday, while Russia’s defense ministry said more than 1,000 Ukrainian drones had been shot down over the country by noon in the past 24 hours.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy vowed retaliation on Friday following Russia’s heaviest drone and missile attack on Kiev in two days since the war began more than four years ago.
Confirming the attack, Zelenskiy released a video showing a drone in flight over X, columns of black smoke and firefighters trying to extinguish the flames.
“Our reaction to Russia’s prolongation of the war and its attacks on our cities and communities is completely justified,” he said.
He added that despite dense Russian air defenses around Moscow, Ukraine was able to hit targets more than 500 kilometers away from the border.
“We say this clearly to the Russians: Their state must end the war,” he said.
Speaking later in the night in a video speech, Zelenskiy said Ukraine’s increased military activity had now created “a tangible change in the balance of action on the front.”
“For example, today’s activity indicators show that our active measures are greater than Russia’s. This is a very important result.” he said, without going into detail.
The Ukrainian army’s General Staff said an attack caused a fire at a facility producing high-precision weapons outside Moscow. The statement also stated that a command post controlling drone flights in the Russian-occupied region of Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region was hit.
Russia’s foreign ministry accused Kiev of targeting civilians.
“The Kiev regime, financed by the EU, carried out another mass terrorist attack accompanied by Eurovision songs,” TASS news agency quoted ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova as saying.
Both sides deny that civilians were deliberately targeted.
Ukraine has stepped up drone strikes on targets deep within Russia in recent weeks, aiming to disable oil refineries, warehouses and pipelines as both sides seek to disrupt each other’s infrastructure.
TASS quoted Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin as saying that since midnight, air defenses have destroyed 81 UAVs heading towards Moscow, making it the biggest attack on the capital in more than a year.
Sobyanin said 12 people were injured, most of them near the entrance to the Moscow oil refinery, and three houses were damaged. He said the refinery’s “technology” was not damaged.
Moscow Region Governor Andrei Vorobyov said that a woman died after a house was hit in Khimki, north of the capital, and rescue teams were looking for another person in the rubble. Two men were killed in the village of Pogorelki in the Mytishchi region.
He said many residences and infrastructure facilities were damaged.
Moscow’s Sheremetyevo, the country’s largest airport, said drone debris fell on its territory but did not cause any damage.
