Russia Says 250 Ukrainian Drones Intercepted in 12 Hours

Russian air defence systems intercepted and destroyed 250 Ukrainian drones over a 12-hour period, according to the Russian Defence Ministry, as drone attacks continue to feature prominently in the ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict.

The ministry said the drones were shot down between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. on Saturday, Moscow time, across 19 Russian regions, including the Moscow area. It described the aircraft as fixed-wing drones but did not provide details on the locations or potential damage caused by the attacks.

Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin said the number of drones detected heading towards the Moscow region had exceeded 2,600 over the previous week. According to him, most were intercepted by air defence systems before reaching heavily populated areas.

Sobyanin said 493 drones had been destroyed while approaching Moscow during the period.

The reported drone activity comes amid continued Russian military operations in Ukraine. On Friday, Russia's Defence Ministry said its forces had captured 11 settlements over the previous week and carried out one large-scale and nine group strikes against Ukrainian military and strategic infrastructure.

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According to the ministry, the settlements were located in the Kharkiv, Donbas and Zaporizhzhia regions. It said the strikes targeted Ukrainian defence-related enterprises, logistics centres, energy and transport infrastructure, as well as facilities involved in producing drones, ground robotic systems and their components.

Russia also claimed that missile launch positions, ammunition and fuel storage facilities, supply sites and temporary deployment locations of Ukrainian forces and foreign military personnel had been targeted.

Ukraine, meanwhile, is preparing its energy infrastructure for the coming winter amid continued attacks on critical facilities.

Ukrainian Energy Minister Denys Shmyhal told parliament on Friday that the government had allocated 35 billion hryvnyas, or about $785 million, to protect energy facilities and improve the resilience of regional power systems.

Shmyhal said construction of around 200 second-level protective structures had already been completed. While acknowledging that no defence system could guarantee complete protection from attacks, he said damage to facilities equipped with such protection could potentially be repaired within weeks.

The latest developments highlight the growing importance of drones and air-defence systems in the conflict. Both Russia and Ukraine have increasingly relied on unmanned aerial systems for long-range strikes and battlefield operations, while also investing heavily in technologies designed to detect and neutralise them.