Russia downs over 400 Ukrainian drones

Russia yesterday said it shot down 419 Ukrainian drones over the country overnight, including in the Moscow region, where authorities said a six-month-old baby was killed.

Kyiv has stepped up its long-range drone strike campaign against Russia in recent months, as Moscow’s full-scale offensive against Ukraine drags on for almost four-and-a-half years years.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said his forces struck Dubna satellite communications site in the Moscow region for the second time in a week.

Air defence systems “intercepted and destroyed 419 Ukrainian fixed-wing unmanned aerial vehicles” around the country, Moscow’s defence ministry posted on Max platform. The governor of the Moscow region, Andrei Vorobyov, later said that drones had hit the village of Yevgoryevsk, south-west of Moscow, hitting a “private house.”

“Unfortunately, a six-month old baby died on the way to hospital,” he said on Telegram. Two adults and another child were hospitalised, he added.

Meanwhile, Russian forces have taken control of the settlements of Rivne and Lisne in Zaporizhzia of Ukraine and Malynivka in the Donetsk region, TASS reported.