MOSCOW: Russia on Saturday said it has downed 170 drones and more than 10 guided missiles overnight over Crimea and several border regions with Ukraine. In a press release on its Telegram channel, the defence ministry said between 22:00 hours Friday and 05:00 hours Saturday, Russian air defence units have destroyed 96 fixed wing drones over Crimea, 47 over Krasnodar territory, 9 over Rostov, 8 each over Bryansk and Kursk regions in South West of Moscow. Two UAVs were also downed over the Belgorod region.
Besides these, 8 Britain-supplied Storm Shadow cruise missiles and 3 Ukraine-developed Neptune-MD guided missiles were destroyed over the Black Sea. In the early hours on Saturday, 14 Ukrainian naval drones were destroyed in the Black Sea, the ministry said.
Meanwhile, governors of some regions have reported civilian damage from Ukrainian drone strikes.
“Two adults and two children were evacuated after fragments from a downed UAV caused a fire on the roof of a house in the village of Tselina. A non-residential building was also damaged,” RT.com news portal reported, quoting Rostov Governor Yuri Slyusar.
Slyusar said the drones were intercepted over several areas, including the mining towns of Novoshakhtinsk and Kamensk-Shakhtinsky. In the Krasnodar region, officials said “drone fragments” damaged three houses in Anapa, a resort town on the Black Sea coast.
Telegram channels reported drone attacks in the port cities of Novorossiysk and Taman near Crimea, with UAV debris found scattered on the streets.
The authorities in Novorossiysk, home to a Russian naval base, said the military was responding to “an attack by UAVs and naval drones”. A drone crashed into a high-rise apartment building in the city.
Krasnodar Governor Veniamin Kondratyev said four people, including two children, were injured in Novorossiysk, where drone strikes damaged three apartment blocks and sparked a fire at a grain terminal.
Ukraine, which has refused to recognise Crimea as part of Russia under the peace deal offered by US President Donald Trump, has escalated its strikes on the peninsula and adjoining coastal regions over the last two days with the help Western supplied weapons.
