Russia has accused Ukraine of a failed attempt to assassinate President Vladimir Putin and has warned that Moscow may retaliate “where and when it sees fit”.
The Russians claim two drones tried to attack the president’s residence within the Kremlin government complex in central Moscow on Wednesday (local time).
Mr Putin was safe, with the Kremlin stating he was not in the building at the time.
One unverified video circulating online shows what appears to be a drone flying towards a dome atop a Kremlin building, followed by an explosion.
The alleged incident came on the eve of Russia’s Victory Day parade on May 9, which Mr Putin uses to boost his image as a strongman.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said his country had nothing to do with the reported incident.
“We don’t attack Putin, or Moscow, we fight on our territory,” said Mr Zelensky during a visit to Finland.
A senior Zelensky aide called the accusation a sign that the Kremlin was planning a major new attack on Ukraine.
Shortly after the Kremlin announcement, Ukraine reported alerts for air strikes over the capital Kyiv and other cities.
‘Retaliatory measures’
Russia claims its military and special services used radar warfare systems to put two unmanned drones “out of action”.
“We regard these actions as a planned terrorist act and an attempt on the president’s life, carried out on the eve of Victory Day, the May 9 Parade, at which the presence of foreign guests is also planned.”
Fragments of drones were scattered in the Kremlin grounds but there were no injuries or damage, it said.
“The Russian side reserves the right to take retaliatory measures where and when it sees fit,” the statement said.
Video posted by Baza, a Telegram channel with links to Russia’s law enforcement agencies, showed a flying object approaching the dome of a Kremlin building overlooking Red Square, exploding in a burst of light just before reaching it.
Other video posted on a neighbourhood internet group showed a plume of smoke over the Kremlin’s gold domes.
Reuters could not independently verify the videos.
In comments sent to Reuters, Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said Ukraine was not involved in the incident: “We do not attack the Kremlin because, first of all, it does not resolve any military tasks.”
Mr Podolyak said the accusation, along with an announcement that Russia had caught suspected saboteurs in Ukraine’s Russian-occupied Crimea region, “clearly indicates the preparation of a large scale terrorist provocation by Russia in the coming days”.
Vyacheslav Volodin, the influential speaker of Russia’s parliament, demanded the use of “weapons capable of stopping and destroying the Kyiv terrorist regime” in response to the alleged drone attack on the Kremlin.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, in remarks quoted by the Washington Post, said the US was unable to validate reports of the drone strike but that he would regard any comment from the Kremlin “with a very large shaker of salt”.
Elsewhere, oil depots were ablaze in both southern Russia and Ukraine, as both sides escalated a drone war ahead of Ukraine’s promised spring counteroffensive against Russian forces.
Scores of firefighters battled a huge conflagration that Russian authorities also blamed on a Ukrainian drone crashing into an oil terminal on Russia’s side of its bridge to Crimea.
A fuel depot in Ukraine was ablaze after a suspected Russian drone strike on the central city of Kropyvnytskyi.
An administrative building in Ukraine’s southern Dnipropetrovsk region was also hit by a drone and set ablaze.
Ukraine said it had shot down 21 of 26 Iranian-made drones in an overnight volley, shielding targets in Kyiv where air raid sirens blared for hours through the night.
Sixteen people were killed by Russian shelling in Ukraine’s southern Kherson region, 12 of them in Kherson city, on Wednesday, the Ukrainian prosecutor’s office said.
Russian forces have regularly shelled the city from parts of the region occupied by Russia.
Ukraine and Russia have both been carrying out long-range strikes since last week in apparent anticipation of a Ukrainian counteroffensive, which Mr Zelensky said would begin soon.
Russia says it has struck military targets although it has produced no evidence to support this.
Ukraine, without confirming any role in incidents in Russia or Crimea, says destroying infrastructure is preparation for its planned ground assault.
-with AAP
