Russian authorities report 201 Ukrainian drones downed overnight in the Moscow region in the escalating conflict.<\/p>\n
Published On 16 Aug 202616 Aug 2026<\/p>\n
At least one person has been killed and three have been wounded in a Ukrainian drone barrage targeting Moscow, a local official says, as Russia has bombarded Kyiv with ballistic missiles.<\/p>\n
Russia\u2019s Ministry of Defence said it destroyed 822 drones across the country overnight. Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin wrote on social media early on Sunday that the city was targeted with 600 drones and \u201c201 drones were destroyed in Moscow region\u201d.<\/p>\n
Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list<\/p>\n
Andrei Vorobyov, governor of the Moscow oblast, wrote on Telegram that an 83-year-old man was killed when a drone hit a private home.<\/p>\n
At least five people were killed in attacks on southern Russia\u2019s Rostov region, which borders Ukraine, according to regional authorities.<\/p>\n
The drone assault came after Ukrainian authorities said late on Saturday that at least one person was killed and seven were wounded in Russian air attacks.<\/p>\n
A woman was killed and six people were wounded in a missile and drone attack on Kryvyi Rih, the hometown of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in central Ukraine, the region\u2019s governor said.<\/p>\n
Officials in the capital said Kyiv was \u201cunder ballistic missile attack\u201d late on Saturday, with at least one person wounded and fires sparked at nonresidential sites in the Obolonskyi and Holosiivskyi districts.<\/p>\n
Defence and foreign policy analyst Pavel Felgenhauer told Al Jazeera that the targeting of capital cities suggests an escalation in the war. He noted that Ukraine had managed to bypass air defences in the Moscow region, which has the \u201cbest and most dense antiair defences in the entirety of Russia\u201d. The attacks did not hit central Moscow but reached the outskirts of the capital, he added.<\/p>\n
Separately, Romania\u2019s Ministry of National Defence reported on Sunday that a Spanish F-18 jet on a NATO air policing mission to Romania had shot down a drone breaching its airspace.<\/p>\n
Martin O\u2019Donnell, a spokesman for NATO\u2019s military headquarters, said the alliance is prepared to defend itself.<\/p>\n
\u201cAdditional details regarding Sunday\u2019s incident remain under investigation, but the drone appears to be Russian,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
It was the fourth drone shot down in Romania this year<\/a>.<\/p>\n The Defence Ministry wrote on social media that the drone came from neighbouring Moldova.<\/p>\n \u201cThe surveillance systems of the Ministry of National Defense detected the intrusion of an aerial target into national airspace, coming from the Republic of Moldova,\u201d it said in a statement.<\/p>\n Romanian\u00a0Defence Minister Radu Miruta congratulated the pilots and military personnel on what he called \u201ca successful mission\u201d.<\/p>\n In July, a Romanian jet shot down a suspected Russian drone<\/a>, and in May, a stray drone injured two people in the Romanian city of Galati when it collided with a building.<\/p>\n Romania shares a 634km (394-mile) border with Ukraine and has repeatedly seen Russian drones breaching its airspace as Moscow escalates its bombing campaign against Ukrainian civilian and military infrastructure.<\/p>\n Escalating long-range strikes<\/p>\n Russia has maintained near-daily missile and drone strikes across Ukraine since launching its full-scale invasion in early 2022, and areas far from the front lines have frequently come under attack.<\/p>\n The war\u2019s impact has also spread to key regional shipping routes with reports of mines<\/a> and unmanned sea drones<\/a> found floating in the Black Sea.<\/p>\n