Ukrainian forces fired more than 1,000 drones at Russia overnight, officials said Sunday, including what Moscow’s mayor described as the “largest ever” attack on the Russian capital.
Russia’s Ministry of Defense said that its forces shot down 1,100 Ukrainian drones across the country, as well as over the annexed Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea and the waters of the Black Sea.
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said that 450 drones had been destroyed en route to the Russian capital. Some drones hit the Moscow Oil Refinery and a residential building, he said.
The major attack comes on the third and final day of voting in Russia's first wartime parliamentary election, balloting that was virtually devoid of opposition to President Vladimir Putin's policies and is all but certain to cement the Kremlin's dominance.
Russia held voting in four Ukrainian regions that Moscow illegally annexed after the war began but still doesn't fully control, and in Crimea, the Black Sea peninsula that was illegally annexed by Russia in 2014. Kyiv has denounced the action as illegal.
Sobyanin said on Sunday that the “unprecedented attack” on the capital was an attempt to disrupt the elections. "The enemy failed in this regard," he said.