Drone attacks in Moscow’s glittering business district leave residents on edge
LA TimesBuildings of the Moscow City business district rise behind people relaxing on a walkway alongside the Moscow River. “I don’t understand how people in a war zone can live like this every day and not go mad.” The Russian Defense Ministry said it shot down two Ukrainian drones outside Moscow and had electronically jammed another, sending it crashing into the IQ-Quarter skyscraper that houses government offices including the Ministry of Economic Development, the Ministry of Digital Development and Communications and the Ministry of Industry and Trade — the same building that was hit Sunday. While Russian state television has largely played down the strikes, one channel sandwiched a segment on how Moscow’s air defenses successfully intercepted the drones in between reports highlighting Russian attacks on Ukraine. Mykhailo Podolyak, an advisor to President Volodymyr Zelensky, said in Ukraine that Moscow “is rapidly getting used to a full-fledged war,” without confirming or denying Kyiv’s involvement in the drone attacks that in recent days have struck from the capital to the Crimean Peninsula. While they haven’t caused much physical damage, bringing the drone campaign to Moscow “blows holes in Russia’s narrative that the war on Ukraine is successful and that it is being prosecuted far away from any consequences for the Russian people themselves,” said Keir Giles, a Russia expert at the Chatham House think tank in London.