Ukraine said on Tuesday it had struck one of Russia’s largest satellite communications centers for the second time in just over a week, as Kyiv steps up long-range drone attacks to pressure the Kremlin to end a four-year war.
The Dubna satellite communications center north of Moscow, about 500 km (310 miles) from the Ukrainian border, is used to gather intelligence and coordinate Russian military forces fighting in Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelensky said.
Russia has not confirmed the strike on the Dubna communications center, but Moscow Region Governor Andrei Vorobyov said the drone hit an “administrative building” in the city, with no casualties reported.
Vorobiev also said a six-month-old baby died on Tuesday after a drone crashed into a house in Yegoryevsk, southeast of Moscow, leaving people trapped under rubble. Rescuers rescued two adults and two children, but the baby died on the way to the hospital, Vorobiev said in his Telegram channel.
Elsewhere, a 61-year-old woman was killed in Russia’s western Tver region after a downed “enemy drone” crashed into a residential summer home, regional authorities said.
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said Russian air defenses had shot down more than 60 drones after several waves of drones were launched towards the Russian capital starting Monday evening. In total, the Russian Ministry of Defense said it intercepted or destroyed 419 drones.
Ukraine is increasing pressure on the Kremlin with strikes on Russian territory, primarily targeting oil refineries, and carrying out large-scale drone strikes on the Russian capital and St. Petersburg. Discontent expressed by some Russians is growing as the war slowly approaches their doorstep, and last week Zelensky announced a 40-day operation aimed at “forcing” Russia to end the war.
On Tuesday, the Ukrainian military said the strikes on Moscow and St. Petersburg were made possible by “an open corridor in the enemy’s dense air defense system.”
Ukrainian military operators are “systematically destroying” radars in the Russian border region of Bryansk, which control the airspace towards the capital, it added.
This is the second time Kyiv has claimed a strike on the Dubna satellite communications center, after the Ukrainian military said on June 22 that it was a strike on the facility. Russian state news agency TASS said it suffered a “massive drone attack” during the incident, but noted that communications and television broadcasts were not affected and no employees were injured.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov criticized Kyiv for the attack in the Moscow region, telling reporters on Tuesday that “civilians are suffering, children are dying.”