It’s getting harder for officials in the Kremlin to cast the war in Ukraine — now in its fifth year — as something so distant that it doesn’t affect the daily routines of Russian civilians.From irritating internet disruptions to this month’s scaled-down Victory Day parade and a massive weekend aerial attack in the Moscow region that killed three people, Russia’s full-scale war no longer seems a distant conflict.Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy cast the attack in Moscow’s suburbs as a just retribution for the relentless and deadly Russian missile and drone strikes on the capital of Kyiv and other cities last week.All these assaults have come only days after President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Donald Trump both suggested that the war in Ukraine was nearing its end.
One of the biggest attacks by Ukraine so farThe Russian Defense Ministry reported Sunday its air defenses downed 1,054 Ukrainian drones in the previous 24 hours, one of the biggest tallies reported by the military. Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin reported 81 drones were downed by the capital’s air defenses from late Saturday to early Sunday.The attacks killed three near the Russian capital, injured 12 others, damaged multiple apartment buildings and destroyed several private homes.One drone hit on the territory of a Moscow refinery but didn’t derail production, Sobyanin said. Another hit an oil tank at a storage facility, causing a blaze that blanketed the area in black smoke.Several Moscow airports suspended operations, with dozens of flights delayed or diverted. One Ukrainian drone fell on the grounds of the capital’s Sheremetyevo airport but didn’t cause any damage, authorities said.
