The wave of almost 600 Ukrainian drones struck overnight across 14 Russian regions13:21, 17 May 2026Updated 15:41, 17 May 2026At least four people died in what appears to be the largest Ukrainian drone strike in months on Moscow and the surrounding areas, according to Russian authorities.‌The wave of almost 600 Ukrainian drones struck overnight across 14 Russian regions, as well as the Crimean peninsula and the Black and Azov seas, the Russian defence ministry said.‌Three people were killed in the Moscow region and one in the Belgorod region, authorities said, as Russian air defences shot down 556 drones overnight.‌A woman was killed after drones hit her house in the city of Khimki, just northwest of the Russian capital, as part of the “massive” strike on the Moscow region. Local governor Andrei Vorobyev said another person remained trapped under the rubble.READ MORE: Vladimir Putin 'plotting strike on NATO' as Zelensky reveals bombshell leaked docsREAD MORE: Russia and Iran using 'disposable' spooks to attack Europe including UK‌Two men were also killed in the village of Pogorelki, six miles north of Moscow, after drone debris fell on a construction site, Vorobyev added. In social media updates, he said Ukrainian drones had also damaged unspecified “infrastructure” and several high-rises.In Moscow itself, at least 12 people were wounded in the nighttime strikes - mostly near the entrance to the city’s oil refinery, according to mayor Sergei Sobyanin.Russian defenses shot down 81 drones headed for Moscow overnight, state agency Tass reported, marking the largest attack on the capital in over a year.‌Russia's largest airport - Moscow's Sheremetyevo - said drone debris had fallen on its premises without causing damage.Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said last week that more drone strikes would be launched in retaliation for a deadly three-day Russian attack across Ukraine.‌Military officials described the attacks as the biggest barrage of the war.. Zelenskyy posted on social media on Friday that Ukraine was “entirely justified” in striking Russia’s oil industry and military production facilities to hamper Moscow’s war effort, as well as hitting “those directly responsible for committing war crimes against Ukraine and Ukrainians”.Russia, whose full-scale invasion of Ukraine began in February 2022, launched more than 1,500 drones and dozens of missiles in the consecutive waves of attacks across Ukraine on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, Ukrainian officials said.A cruise missile hit a nine-storey apartment block in Kyiv on Thursday, killing 24 people, including three children.‌Ukraine’s air force said on Sunday it had intercepted a further 279 Russian drones overnight, out of a total of 287 launched.Moscow and Kyiv have returned to trading attacks since the end last Tuesday of a three-day truce – which both sides accused the other of violating – to mark the anniversary of victory over Nazi Germany in the second world war.Diplomatic efforts to end the four-year-old conflict are at a standstill, with Kyiv unwilling to accept Moscow’s maximalist demands for territory in the eastern Donbas region and US attention turned to the US-Israeli war against Iran.Article continues below