Russia claimed on Sunday, September 1, to have foiled “massive” Ukrainian drone attacks overnight targeting 14 of its regions and its capital Moscow, a few days after large-scale strikes by the Russian army against Ukrainian energy infrastructure. At the same time, Ukraine is continuing its incursion into the border region of Kursk, in the hope of weakening Russian forces advancing in Donbass.
Key information to remember
⇒ The Russian Defense Ministry claims to have shot down 158 Ukrainian drones.
⇒ More than ten Russian regions have been targeted by kyiv
⇒ Russia compares Ukrainian incursion in Kursk to Islamist attacks of 2004
Russia says it repelled ‘massive’ Ukrainian drone attacks
According to the Russian Defense Ministry, its air defenses shot down 158 Ukrainian explosive drones over 14 regions, in addition to Moscow, on Saturday night – a few days after the Russian military carried out major strikes on Ukrainian energy infrastructure. The ministry said in a statement on Telegram that the largest number of them (122) were shot down over the Kursk, Bryansk, Voronezh and Belgorod regions, all bordering Ukraine. Two devices were intercepted over Moscow, the capital located more than 500 kilometers from the border between the two countries, according to the source.
Rescue services, quoted by Russian news agencies, reported “a fire” at the Kapotnya oil refinery in south-east Moscow. A local official in the Moscow region also said that three drones had attempted to strike the Kachira coal-fired power plant, without causing “any casualties or damage”.
This is not the first time that Moscow – and its region – have been targeted by Ukrainian attacks, although these remain rare. On August 21, it suffered “one of the most significant” attacks coming from Ukraine, according to Sergei Sobyanin, a close friend of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Around ten regions targeted by these air attacks
In total, about ten Russian regions were targeted overnight by the barrage of Ukrainian explosive drones. “Our defenders are repelling an attempt at a massive drone attack on the territory of the Bryansk region,” reported the region’s governor, Alexander Bogomaz, who did not give further details. In the Belgorod region, Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said that “the windows of three residential buildings in (the eponymous city of) Belgorod are damaged.” “In a private residence, a warehouse was completely destroyed,” he added.
The mass drone attack comes days after Ukraine’s energy infrastructure was targeted by more than 200 Russian drones and missiles, in one of the largest such attacks since Russia began its offensive more than two and a half years ago. It’s also been nearly a month since Ukraine launched a major offensive in Russia’s Kursk region, taking control of 100 towns, according to kyiv, as Russian troops continue their push into eastern Ukraine.
Russia marks 20th anniversary of 2004 Islamist attacks
Russia is marking the 20th anniversary of the hostage-taking by an Islamist commando in a school in Beslan, in the Russian Caucasus, which resulted in a massacre that left 334 people dead, including 186 children, and traumatized the country. On August 20, Russian President Vladimir Putin, who was already in power at the time of the attack, visited the school for the first time and compared the massacre to the ongoing Ukrainian military offensive in the Kursk region.
“Just as we fought the terrorists, today we must fight those who commit crimes in the Kursk region, in Donbass,” he said, resuming his argument about the “denazification” of Ukraine.
On September 1, 2004, an armed group of Chechens and Ingush entered School Number One in Beslan, in the Russian republic of North Ossetia, and held more than a thousand people captive in atrocious conditions for about fifty hours. This attack, the deadliest in Russian history, occurred at a time when the Second Chechen War pitted the Russian army against a separatist rebellion that was gradually becoming Islamized.
On September 3, a double explosion inside the school of unknown origin sowed panic and prompted Russian forces to launch a chaotic assault that ended in bloodshed. In 2017, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) criticized the Russian authorities for disproportionate use of force.