This Friday, Ukraine said it had shot down 21 of 29 “drones” (unmanned aerial vehicles) launched by Russia overnight, without causing any serious damage.
“Air defenses shot down 21 out of 29 attack drones launched against the Nikolaev, Kherson, Dnieper, Cherkasy, Kirovograd and Khmelnytsky regions” in the south and center of the country, the Ukrainian Air Force reported.
The devices, as always, were developed by the Iranian Shahed, the BBC added on social networks, citing the French agency AFP.
In Moscow on Friday, Russia’s Defense Ministry said in its weekly report that it had carried out 41 combined attacks using precision-guided weapons and a massive strike on Ukrainian military industrial sites over the past seven days.
According to a report cited by the Spanish news agency EFE, attacks from December 30 to this Friday also included targets such as command posts, military airfields, arsenals and fuel depots.
The defense stated that the strikes also hit “areas of deployment of units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, nationalist formations and foreign mercenaries.”
“All intended targets have been hit,” the Russian ministry said.
Given the stalemate on the front line, both sides are intensifying attacks on the enemy’s rearguards.
In recent days, Ukraine has bombed several Russian border areas, in particular the city of Belgorod, where material damage was caused.
Kyiv also continues to put pressure on the annexed Crimean peninsula, where it launched about 30 drones this morning, EFE added.
The war was triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022.
During the current war, Russia annexed the Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporozhye and Kherson after doing the same with Crimea in 2014.
Ukraine and most of the international community do not recognize the annexation, and Kyiv is even demanding the withdrawal of the Russian army from the entire territory of the country, including Crimea.