Ukraine launched a massive wave of drone attacks against Moscow and the surrounding region on Sunday, killing three people, damaging residential property and hitting a major oil refinery as Russians cast ballots on the final day of the country’s parliamentary elections.
The assault was described by Russian authorities as the largest Ukrainian drone attack reported against Moscow since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said more than 1,600 drones had been intercepted across various defensive lines since Saturday, including about 450 that were heading towards Moscow. Despite the air-defence response, some drones reached their targets, including an oil refinery and residential areas.
The strikes caused fires and damage across parts of the Moscow region. Images from the area showed smoke rising from an industrial facility identified as part of Moscow’s oil-refining infrastructure, while a residential building was also damaged.
Moscow Region Governor Andrei Vorobyov initially reported two deaths before confirming that a third victim later died in hospital. He also said about 400 residents, including children, were evacuated after a drone strike damaged a 21-storey residential building.
Sobyanin accused Ukraine of attempting to disrupt Russia’s parliamentary elections on their final voting day.
“The unprecedented attack was clearly planned with the aim of disrupting the elections,” he said, while maintaining that the alleged objective had not been achieved.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, however, described the strikes as part of Ukraine’s campaign against Russian infrastructure supporting the war. He said Ukrainian long-range attacks had significantly affected the Moscow region and claimed that a major Russian oil-industry facility and a logistics facility had been hit.
The competing accounts from Russia and Ukraine could not immediately establish the full extent of the damage independently.
The drone attack occurred as Russian voters went to the polls for the final day of elections to the 450-seat State Duma, the lower house of parliament. Voting began on Friday and continued for three days, making it the first parliamentary election in Russia since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
More than 111 million Russians were eligible to vote, with both in-person and electronic voting available in parts of the country. The Central Election Commission reported turnout of 56.66% when the polls closed.
The ruling United Russia party, which supports President Vladimir Putin, subsequently secured 355 of the 450 seats in the State Duma, according to reported election results, preserving its constitutional majority.
The election took place amid heightened political tensions and continued fighting between Russia and Ukraine. Opposition figures and anti-war political activists have faced restrictions, imprisonment or exile in recent years, while Russia also organised voting in Ukrainian territories it claims to have annexed.
Ukraine and several international actors have rejected Russia’s conduct of elections in those territories, disputing Moscow’s authority to hold the vote there.
The Moscow drone attack added another layer of tension to an already closely watched election, highlighting the continuing ability of Ukrainian forces to strike targets deep inside Russian territory.
Ukraine has repeatedly used long-range drones against Russian military, energy and industrial infrastructure during the conflict, while Russia has continued launching missile and drone attacks against targets across Ukraine.
The latest strikes came amid renewed international efforts to address the conflict, underscoring the continuing difficulty of reducing hostilities despite ongoing diplomatic efforts.