Moscow sees one of the biggest Ukrainian drone strikes of war

Almost a dozen drones attacked Moscow early on Wednesday, Moscow’s Mayor Sergey Sobyanin said. He described it as one of the largest Ukrainian drone attacks on the city since the war began more than two years ago, according to a translated social media post. The drones attacked the city in small batches of one or two projectiles at a time, reported the Kremlin-run media outlet RT. Sobyanin said the city’s air defenses shot down all the drones before they could hit their targets but did not say what he believed their intended targets were, according to RT.

Another Kremlin-run media outlet, TASS, confirmed Moscow came under fire from unmanned aerial vehicles early Wednesday. TASS added that Ukrainian drones also targeted several other areas of Russia. In the Bryansk region alone, nearly two dozen Ukrainian drones were neutralized by Russian air defenses, TASS reported.

What does Ukraine say about the alleged attack? Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy did not publicly comment on Russia’s allegations on Wednesday morning.

Does this have anything to do with the Kursk incursion? Ukrainian soldiers controlled almost 500 square miles of Russian territory in the Kursk region after barreling across Russia’s border earlier this month, Zelenskyy said on Monday. The Kremlin insisted on Tuesday that Kyiv’s forces were no longer advancing in the region. Ukraine has lost more than 4,100 troops in the incursion, the Kremlin said. Zelenskyy added on Tuesday that the troops were accomplishing their goals.

Moscow will not engage in peace talks with Ukraine until Kyiv’s regime is completely defeated on the battlefield, Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev said Wednesday. Russia’s Foreign Ministry on Wednesday summoned U.S. diplomats in Moscow to the Kremlin to discuss the alleged involvement of the American private military company Forward Observation Group in the Kursk incursion, RT reported.

Dig deeper: Listen to Lindsay Mast’s conversation with Russia expert John Hardie about the Kursk incursion on The World and Everything in It podcast.