Russia says 13 Ukrainian drones downed near Crimea and Moscow
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The Russian port Novorossiysk, south of the Kerch Strait, where an oil and chemical tanker was hit by a Ukrainian drone attack on Aug 4.
PHOTO: AFP
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MOSCOW – Russia said on Thursday that it had downed 13 Ukrainian drones seeking to attack the largest city in Russian-annexed Crimea and Moscow.
Russia’s Defence Ministry said two drones were hit by air defences near Sevastopol, the city in Crimea which serves as Russia’s Black Sea navy base, and nine more were jammed and crashed into the Black Sea.
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 Defence Ministry said.
“Today... attempts by the Kyiv regime to carry out terrorist attacks with unmanned aerial vehicles were thwarted,” the ministry said. There were no casualties.
Drone air strikes deep inside Russia have increased since a drone 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 in August.
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 who is behind attacks on Russian territory, although officials have publicly expressed satisfaction over them.
The New York Times reported in May that United States intelligence agencies believed Ukrainian spies or military intelligence were behind the drone strike on the Kremlin. REUTERS
