The Ukrainian Air Force said on Sunday it had shot down 45 explosive drones in a strike launched by Russian forces on New Year’s Eve.
“During the night of December 31, 2022 to January 1, 2023, the Russian occupation forces attacked Ukraine with ‘drones’ ‘kamikazes’ [armadilhados com explosivos] Shared, Iranian-made,” the Ukrainian Armed Forces Air Force said in a statement posted on the Telegram network and carried by the Ukrinform news agency.
According to the same statement, the anti-aircraft defense of the Air Force, in cooperation with other branches of the Armed Forces, “destroyed 45 drones”, 13 shot down in 2022 and 32 in 2023.
The military administration of the Ukrainian capital, kyiv, reported, in turn, that 32 air targets were identified and shot down overnight in the city area.
US Ambassador to Ukraine Bridget Brink called Moscow’s overnight attack “cowardly.”
“It’s unbelievable. Russia attacked Ukraine in a cold and cowardly manner in the early hours of the new year,” the diplomat said, in a post on the social network Twitter, stressing that the United States “has full confidence” that kyiv “will win in 2023”. .
Moscow has adopted the tactic of attacking power plants, among other targets, using explosive drones.
The Russian military offensive in Ukraine was launched on February 24 due to “the need to ‘denazify’ and demilitarize Ukraine for Russia’s security,” as justified by Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The war, which has dragged on for more than 10 months, has been condemned by the broader international community, which has responded by sending weapons to Ukraine and imposing political and economic sanctions on Russia.
Source: Observadora
