The mayor of the Russian capital, Sergei Sobyanin, said Tuesday that Russian air defenses shot down three Ukrainian drones this morning in the Moscow, Kaluga and Tver regions in the west of the country.
“The air defenses of the Kaluga region and the Istrinsky district destroyed drones trying to attack Moscow,” and damage was recorded after debris fell on Istrinsky, Sobyanin said on the Telegram messaging platform.
The mayor also indicated that a third drone heading towards the capital was destroyed by Russian air defense in Zavidovo, in the Tver region in the north-west of the country, without causing any casualties or damage.
In three separate statements, the Russian Defense Ministry confirmed that one drone was shot down in the Kaluga region, another in the Istrinsky district, northwest of Moscow, and another in the Tver region.
The ministry’s statements attributed the “terrorist attack” to Ukraine, but did not say the drones had targeted the Russian capital.
Ukraine has intensified attacks in the Black Sea, Crimea and against Moscow, mainly using drones, which have already caused serious damage, such as the Russian warship Olenogorsky Gornyak and the Kerch bridge, which connects the Crimean peninsula with the mainland of Russia.
On Monday, Russia said it had shot down a Ukrainian drone over Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula, annexed by Russian forces in 2014, as well as a second drone over Russia’s Kursk region near the border with Ukraine.
The still Ukrainian Defense Minister stated that Ukraine will increase the production of ‘drones’ already in autumn, in an interview with the Ukrainian news agency Ukrinform, published on Sunday.
“I think that this fall there will be a ‘boom’ in the production of various Ukrainian ‘drones’ – flying, hovering, crawling – and it will continue to grow in volume,” Oleksii Reznikov said, referring to the policy of increasing the manufacture of this gun started almost a year ago.
The government simplified or eliminated some laws and regulations, giving “an opportunity to have this momentum, especially for ‘drone’ manufacturers who started production in workshops,” he said.
On Sunday night, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced that he would replace Reznikov with Rustem Umerov, a prominent leader of the Crimean Tatar community who has represented Kiev in sensitive negotiations with Moscow.
Source: TSF
