Russia Claims 644 Ukrainian Drones Downed as Trump Attacks Kyiv’s Refinery Strikes

Russia’s defence ministry said on Friday that 644 Ukrainian drones were intercepted over 26 Russian regions and annexed Crimea overnight, as President Donald Trump called Ukrainian attacks on Russian refineries a “disgrace”.

In the Vladimir region, Governor Alexander Avdeyev said air defences repelled an attack aimed at municipal heating infrastructure serving the regional capital. According to Avdeyev, there was “minor” damage. Unverified reporting by monitoring channels that shared video of an explosion against the dark sky claimed it targeted a data centre owned by the tech giant Yandex in Vladimir, which was previously damaged in last weekend’s strike.

Moscow’s mayor, Sergei Sobyanin, said air defences shot down 94 Ukrainian drones on approach to the capital between Thursday evening and Friday morning. Nearly 160 flights were delayed or cancelled across Moscow’s four main airports, with Sheremetyevo and Vnukovo bearing the brunt.

Meanwhile, in Ukraine, a Russian attack on the eastern city of Kharkiv killed three people and injured five. Russian strikes also left 370,000 residents in Ukraine’s north-western Volyn region, near the Polish border, without electricity. Polish and Nato fighter jets were scrambled to safeguard Polish airspace. Rolling blackouts were also introduced in Kyiv during Russian attacks, said the private energy provider DTEK on X.

Trump blindsided Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, last weekend by announcing that Ukraine and Russia had agreed not to target each other’s energy facilities. Facing US midterm elections in November, Trump has blamed Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries for pushing up energy prices that could cost him at the ballot box. Ukraine struck a Russian oil refinery after Zelensky declared that Kyiv was abandoning the energy ceasefire Trump had announced, and criticised his willingness to strike deals with Moscow.

“All he’s doing is making the world oil price higher. Well, I think that’s a disgrace,” Trump said in an interview with the Newsmax outlet, after Ukraine hit a refinery south-east of Moscow which helps supply the Russian capital. For his part, President Vladimir Putin played down the effect of Ukrainian attacks on Russian refineries, saying they had caused “nothing particularly significant”.

Behind the duelling statements lies an uncomfortable truth for Kyiv’s supporters: Washington’s attention has shifted from defeating Russian aggression to managing the price of oil. Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine continues, its forces still striking Kharkiv and Volyn, its drones and missiles still targeting the infrastructure that keeps Ukrainian civilians alive through the winter. Ukraine, defending its sovereignty against an unprovoked assault, is meanwhile being criticised for striking the very refineries that fund Moscow’s war machine.

Trump’s intervention, and the deals he is prepared to strike with the Kremlin, risk handing Putin the diplomatic advantage he has sought since the full-scale invasion began. The World House, which maintains a dedicated page outlining its support for Ukraine at worldhouse.uk/support, continues to document the consequences of Russia’s aggression.