Ukraine targets Moscow in mass drone attack as Russia bombards Kyiv

Russian authorities report 201 Ukrainian drones downed overnight in the Moscow region in the escalating conflict.

At least one person has been killed and three have been wounded in a Ukrainian drone barrage targeting Moscow, a local official says, as Russia has bombarded Kyiv with ballistic missiles.

Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin wrote on social media early on Sunday that the city was targeted with 600 drones and “201 drones were destroyed in Moscow region”.

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Andrei Vorobyov, governor of the Moscow Oblast, wrote on Telegram that an 83-year-old man was killed when a drone hit a private home.

At least three people were killed in attacks on southern Russia’s Rostov region, which borders Ukraine, according to regional authorities.

The drone assault came after Ukrainian authorities said at least one person was killed and seven were wounded in Russian air attacks.

A woman was killed and six people were wounded in a missile and drone attack on Kryvyi Rih, the hometown of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in central Ukraine, the region’s governor said.

Officials in the capital said Kyiv was “under ballistic missile attack” late on Saturday with at least one person wounded and fires sparked at nonresidential sites in the Obolonsky and Holosiivskyi districts.

Separately, Romania’s Ministry of National Defence reported on Sunday that a Spanish F-18 fighter jet pilot on a NATO air policing mission to Romania had shot down a drone illegally breaching its airspace.

It was the fourth drone shot down in Romania this year.

The Defence Ministry wrote on social media that the drone came from neighbouring Moldova.

“The surveillance systems of the Ministry of National Defense detected the intrusion of an aerial target into national airspace, coming from the Republic of Moldova,” it said in a statement.

Defence Minister Radu Miruta congratulated the pilots and military personnel on what he called “a successful mission”.

In July, a Romanian jet shot down a suspected Russian drone, and in May, a stray drone injured two people in the Romanian city of Galati when it collided with a building.

Romania shares a 634km (394-mile) border with Ukraine and has repeatedly seen Russian drones breaching its airspace as Moscow escalates its bombing campaign against Ukrainian civilian and military infrastructure.

Escalating long-range strikes

Russia has maintained near-daily missile and drone strikes across Ukraine since launching its full-scale invasion in early 2022, and areas far from the front lines have frequently come under attack.

The war’s impact has also spread to key regional shipping routes with reports of mines and unmanned sea drones found floating in the Black Sea.

Civilian casualties in Ukraine hit their highest level since 2022 this July with at least 437 killed and 2,610 injured, according to the United Nations Human Rights Monitoring Mission.

Ukraine has increasingly targeted military, industrial and logistical facilities deep inside Russia, arguing its strikes are a response to Moscow’s ongoing bombardment of Ukrainian towns and infrastructure.