Drones hit Moscow high-rises as Kyiv struck for third day

Moscow, May 30 (AFP/APP):A swarm of drones hit Moscow on Tuesday in an unprecedented attack, while Russian drones struck Kyiv for a third straight day as Ukraine gears up for a major offensive against Russian forces.

The Russian defence ministry blamed Kyiv for the attacks that saw three drones crash into residential buildings in Moscow.

Officials said no one was seriously injured and there was only “minor” damage to buildings.

The Russian defence ministry said that eight drones were used in the attack, adding that five of them were downed and three disabled.

Of the three that hit residential buildings, two crashed into high-rises located in Moscow’s affluent southwest, while a third damaged a residential building in a suburb of the capital.

The other drones fell outside Moscow. Some of the debris was found around 15 kilometres from President Vladimir Putin’s Novo-Ogaryovo residence.

One video shared on social media showed an explosion followed by a column of smoke rising into the sky.

Two drones were intercepted over the Kremlin earlier this month but Tuesday’s attack was the first time that unmanned aerial vehicles hit residential areas of Moscow, hundreds of kilometres from the front lines in Ukraine.

The raids are likely to be seen as a psychological blow and a major embarrassment for the Kremlin, which has gone to great lengths to say the protracted conflict in Ukraine does not pose a threat to Russians.

The Kremlin insisted that there was no “threat” to Russians, adding that Putin was being informed of the attacks in “real time”.