Russia Says Downed Several Ukrainian Drones Headed for Moscow, Following Mass Strike on Kyiv

This handout photograph taken and released by Ukrainian Emergency Service on November 25, 2023, shows a rescuer working at the site of a drone attack in Kyiv. (Handout / Ukrainian Emergency Service / AFP)
This handout photograph taken and released by Ukrainian Emergency Service on November 25, 2023, shows a rescuer working at the site of a drone attack in Kyiv. (Handout / Ukrainian Emergency Service / AFP)
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Russia Says Downed Several Ukrainian Drones Headed for Moscow, Following Mass Strike on Kyiv

This handout photograph taken and released by Ukrainian Emergency Service on November 25, 2023, shows a rescuer working at the site of a drone attack in Kyiv. (Handout / Ukrainian Emergency Service / AFP)
This handout photograph taken and released by Ukrainian Emergency Service on November 25, 2023, shows a rescuer working at the site of a drone attack in Kyiv. (Handout / Ukrainian Emergency Service / AFP)

Russian authorities on Sunday claimed that Ukraine tried to attack Moscow with dozens of drones overnight, just a day after Russia launched its most intense drone attack on Kyiv since the beginning of its full-scale war in 2022, according to Ukrainian officials.

Russian air defenses brought down at least 24 drones over the Moscow region — which surrounds but does not include the capital — and three other provinces to the south and west, the Russian Defense Ministry and Moscow mayor Sergei Sobyanin reported in a series of Telegram updates. Neither referenced any casualties.

Andrei Vorobyev, governor of the Moscow region, wrote on Telegram that the drone strikes damaged three unspecified buildings there, adding that no one was hurt.

Russian Telegram channels reported that one drone crashed into a 12-story apartment block in the western Russian city of Tula, about 180 kilometers (113 miles) south of Moscow, injuring one resident and frightening others.

Moscow’s Vnukovo and Domodedovo airports also briefly shut down because of the drone attack, according to Russia’s state-run news agency Tass. Both appeared to have resumed normal operation by 6 a.m. local time, according to data from international flight tracking portals.

As of late morning Sunday, Ukrainian officials did not acknowledge or comment on the strikes, which came a day after Russia targeted the Ukrainian capital with over 60 Iranian-made Shahed drones. At least five civilians were wounded in the hourslong assault, which saw several buildings damaged by falling debris from downed drones, including a kindergarten. The wounded included an 11-year-old child, according to Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko.

The attack was “the most massive air attack by drones on Kyiv" in the war so far, Serhii Popko, head of the Kyiv city administration, said on Saturday. Ukrainian air force spokesman Yurii Ihnat confirmed later that same day that air defenses shot down 66 air targets over the Ukrainian capital and surrounding region throughout the morning.

The attack on Kyiv was carried out on the morning of Holodomor Memorial Day, which commemorates the manmade famine in Soviet Ukraine that killed millions of Ukrainians from 1932 to 1933. It is marked on the fourth Saturday in November.



Police Say Gunmen Open Fire on Vehicles in Pakistan's Restive Northwest, Killing at Least 8

FILE PHOTO: A member of the Airport Security Force ASF stands guard near the wreckage of vehicles after an explosion near Jinnah International Airport in Karachi, Pakistan October 6, 2024. REUTERS/Shakil Adil/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: A member of the Airport Security Force ASF stands guard near the wreckage of vehicles after an explosion near Jinnah International Airport in Karachi, Pakistan October 6, 2024. REUTERS/Shakil Adil/File Photo
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Police Say Gunmen Open Fire on Vehicles in Pakistan's Restive Northwest, Killing at Least 8

FILE PHOTO: A member of the Airport Security Force ASF stands guard near the wreckage of vehicles after an explosion near Jinnah International Airport in Karachi, Pakistan October 6, 2024. REUTERS/Shakil Adil/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: A member of the Airport Security Force ASF stands guard near the wreckage of vehicles after an explosion near Jinnah International Airport in Karachi, Pakistan October 6, 2024. REUTERS/Shakil Adil/File Photo

Gunmen opened fire on passenger vehicles carrying Shiite Muslims in restive northwest Pakistan on Thursday, killing at least eight people and wounding others, police said.
The attack happened in Kurram, a district in the northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province where clashes between majority Sunni Muslims and minority Shiites have killed dozens of people in recent months.
No one has claimed responsibility but Kurram has been a scene of sectarian violence in recent months, and the latest violence came a week after authorities reopened a key highway in the region after keeping it closed for weeks following deadly clashes.
Local police official Nusrat Hussain said several vehicles carrying passengers were traveling in a convoy from the city of Parachinar to Peshawar, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, when gunmen opened fire.
He said at least five passengers were in a critical condition at a hospital.
Shiite Muslims make up about 15 percent of the 240 million population of Sunni-majority Pakistan, which has a history of sectarian animosity between the two communities.