Russia shoots down 5 Ukrainian UAVs near Moscow; Kiev reports destruction of 3 of Russia's newest fighter jets

Reuters news agency quoted a statement from the Russian Defense Ministry saying that the country's air defense forces intercepted 10 Ukrainian drones, including 5 UAVs, south of Moscow in less than an hour on December 22.

The Russian Defense Ministry said four drones were intercepted over the city of Kaluga and a fifth was destroyed inside the Moscow region.

Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin, apparently referring to the latter incident, said fragments of the drone had fallen in the city of Podolsk but caused no casualties or damage. The remaining five drones had been intercepted in border areas.

Drone attacks on Moscow have eased since the summer, when they repeatedly hit a business district of the capital and forced the airport to close frequently. In May, two drones exploded on the roof of a Kremlin building but did not cause serious damage.

On the same day, Ukrainian Air Force Commander Mykola O Meatchuk said on his Telegram channel that his country had shot down three Russian Su-34 supersonic bombers on the southern front.

Speaking to Ukrainke Radio, Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council Oleksii Danilov added that the Su-34s posed a danger to the country's soldiers and that their downing was the result of a long hunt.

According to the Kyiv Independent, the Ukrainian side did not disclose exactly where the Russian Su-24 supersonic fighter jets were shot down, but Russian military Telegram channels revealed that they were shot down near the Krynky village on the southern bank of the Dnipro River in Kherson province. This area is currently under Russian control.

Military Telegram channels also revealed that the Su-34s shot down on December 22 were shot down by the US-made MIM-104 Patriot air defense system. However, this information has not been confirmed by any party.

The newspaper quoted Ukrainian Air Force spokesman Yuryi Ihnat as saying that the Su-34 is one of the newest aircraft in service with the Russian military, each costing "at least $50 million" and that their downing has long been excluded from Russia's loss statistics.

However, the open-source intelligence monitoring site Oryx estimates that since launching a special military operation in Ukraine, Russia has lost 88 military aircraft, 21 of which were Su-34 fighters.