The four international airports around Moscow temporarily suspended their flights on Tuesday, the Russian forces having intercepted more than 100 Ukrainian drones drawn in nearly a dozen Russian regions, the Ministry of Defense in Moscow announced.
Nine other Russian regional airports have also temporarily ceased their activities, drones that have struck areas along the border with Ukraine and Russia, according to the Russian civil aviation agency, Rosaviatsia, and the Ministry of Defense. This is the second consecutive night when the Moscow region would have been targeted.
The drone attack threatened the 72-hour unilateral ceasefire announced by President Vladimir Putin to coincide with Moscow celebrations of the Second World War victory day.
The day commemorating Moscow’s victory over Nazi Germany in 1945 is the largest secular celebration in Russia. Chinese President Xi Jinping, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula Da Silva and other personalities will bring together Thursday in the Russian capital for the 80th anniversary and will attend a parade of thousands of soldiers accompanied by tanks and missiles.
Security measures should be reinforced. Russian officials warned that Internet access could be restricted in Moscow during the celebrations and asked residents not to draw fireworks.
Putin announced last week a brief unilateral truce “for humanitarian reasons” as of May 8. Ukraine called for a longer ceasefire.
Russia de facto rejected the American proposal for an immediate and total stop of 30 -day battles, emphasizing large -scale conditions. Ukraine accepted the proposal, according to President Volodymyr Zelensky.
US President Donald Trump told the White House on Monday that this brief truce “does not seem much, but it is (…) much if we know where we come from.”
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitri Peskov said on Tuesday that ceasefire orders had been given to the Russian troops, but that they would retaliate in the event of fire.
Ukraine uses increasingly sophisticated drones, made locally, to compensate for the presence of an army smaller than Russia on a front line of around 1000 kilometers and to bring war on Russian soil thanks to long -range strikes.
-Russia has used Shahed drones, as well as 1300 kilograms, artillery and cruising and ballistic missiles against Ukraine.
Two people were injured in the Russian region of Koursk, according to local governor Alexandre Khinshtein, and damage was reported in the Voronej region.
Russian information could not be verified independently.
In addition, the Ukrainian Air Force said that Russia had drawn 136 attack and lure drones overnight.
The Russian forces pulled at least 20 Shahed drones on Kharkiv, the second city in Ukraine near the border with Russia, injuring four people, wrote the regional governor Oleh Syniehubov on Telegram.
The drones triggered a fire on the largest Kharkiv market, Barabashovo, destroying and damaging a hundred stalls, he said.
Seven other civilians were injured elsewhere in the Kharkiv region by hovering bombs and Russian drones, added Syniehubov.
In Kramatorsk, in the Donetsk region, east of Ukraine, Russian drones Shahed killed a person and injured two others, wrote the mayor Oleksandr Honharenko on Facebook. Drones have targeted residential and industrial areas of the city, he said.
In the Odessa region, Russian drones have struck residential buildings and civil infrastructure, killing a person, wrote the head of the Oleg Kiper region on Telegram.
