MOSCOW (Reuters) -Russia said on Thursday it had shot down 105 Ukrainian drones over Russian regions, including dozens heading towards Moscow, as the war in Ukraine heats up even as major powers talk about ways to end Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War Two.
U.S. President Donald Trump is pressuring Russia and Ukraine to end the more than three-year war but the two sides remain far apart. Ukraine and its Western allies are demanding an immediate, unconditional ceasefire but Russia says certain conditions must first be met that Kyiv says are unacceptable.
But while leaders talk of the prospects for peace, the war is intensifying: swarms of drones are being launched by both sides while fierce fighting is underway along key parts of the front.
Russia’s defence ministry said 105 drones had been shot down over Russian regions between midnight and the early morning of Thursday, including 35 over the Moscow region. The previous day, Russia said it shot down well over 300 Ukrainian drones.
Sergei Sobyanin, Moscow’s mayor, said multiple drones had been shot down heading towards the capital, which along with the surrounding region has a population of 21 million people.
Moscow’s Domodedovo and Zhukovsky airports briefly halted flights.
Separately, Russia said on Thursday it had fired an Iskander-M missile at part of the city of Pokrov, formerly known as Ordzhonikidze, in Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk region, destroying two Patriot missile launchers and an AN/MPQ-65 radar set.
Ukraine’s air force reported damage in the Dnipropetrovsk region after an attack but did not specify the type of weapon.
Russia’s defence ministry said its forces were advancing at key points along the front, and pro-Russian war bloggers said Russia had pierced Ukrainian lines between Pokrovsk and Kostiantynivka in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in his nightly video address that the heaviest frontline battles were around Pokrovsk. He made no reference to any Russian advances.
Russia currently controls a little under one fifth of Ukraine, and says the territory is now formally part of Russia, a position Ukraine and its European allies do not accept.
Moscow annexed Crimea in 2014. Russian forces also control almost all of Luhansk and more than 70% of the Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions, according to Russian estimates. Russia also controls a sliver of Kharkiv region.
(Reporting by Reuters in Moscow and Kyiv; editing by Guy Faulconbridge and Gareth Jones)
