Ukrainian drones downed near Crimea and Moscow
Moscow: Russia says it has downed 13 Ukrainian drones seeking to attack Moscow and the largest city in Russian-annexed Crimea.
The Russian Defence Ministry said two drones were hit by air defences near Sevastopol, which serves as Russia’s Black Sea navy base, and nine more were jammed and crashed into the Black Sea.
An Emergency Ministry employee and his dog work at the side of the Zagorsk Optical and Mechanical Plant after the blast in the city of Sergiev Posad, Moscow Region on Wednesday.Credit: EMPS/AP
One drone was shot down as it approached the Russian capital over the Kaluga region, south-west of Moscow, and another was shot down over the prestigious Odintsovo district of Moscow region, the ministry said.
“Today... attempts by the Kyiv regime to carry out terrorist attacks with unmanned aerial vehicles were thwarted,” the ministry said. It said there were no casualties due to the drones.
Separately, Russia’s emergency service said early on Thursday that an auto repair shop caught fire in Domodedovo, also outside Moscow, 10 kilometres away from one the major Russian airports, RIA news agency reported.
“The size of the fire is 1000 square metres,” RIA quoted the statement.
Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting in Moscow on Wednesday.Credit: Kremlin/Reuters
Two explosions were heard before the fire, according to posts on Russian social media.
On Wednesday, Russia said it had shot down two Ukrainian drones near Moscow, one of them over Domodedovo. While an explosion on the grounds of a factory 65km north of Moscow that makes optical equipment for Russian security forces wounded dozens of people, six of them severely, officials said.
The number of drone air strikes deep inside Russia have increased since one was destroyed over the Kremlin in early May. Civilian areas of the capital were hit later in May and a Moscow business district was targeted twice in three days earlier this month.
In recent days, Ukrainian remotely piloted boats, also referred to as drones, have attacked a Russian fuel tanker and a navy base at Russia’s Novorossiysk port on the Black Sea.
Ukraine typically does not comment on attacks on Russian territory, although officials have publicly expressed satisfaction over them.
The New York Times reported in May that American intelligence agencies believed Ukrainian spies or military intelligence were behind the first drone strike on the Kremlin.
Reuters