Ukraine says it repelled one of Russia's largest drone attacks of war

By Anastasiia Malenko and Tom Balmforth

KYIV (Reuters) -Ukraine's air force said on Wednesday it repelled one of Russia's largest long-range drone attacks of the war overnight, shooting down all 89 drones launched at Kyiv, the surrounding region and other areas.

The attack, which came more than 29 months after Russia's full-scale invasion, primarily targeted Kyiv and the surrounding region where authorities said more than 40 drones were shot down. An air raid alert remained in place most of the night.

"This is one of the most massive attacks by Shahed-131/136 strike drones," the air force said, naming the type of drone it says Russia has used in the thousands for strikes on Ukraine.

Military spy agency spokesman Andriy Yusov said in televised remarks that Russia had used a "significant" number of decoy drones that were not loaded with explosives to try to deplete Ukraine's air defences and also identify their locations.

Kyiv, which has repeatedly appealed to allies to supply more air defences, conceals the locations of its air defence units, which are tasked with engaging daily missile and drone attacks by Russia.

A military spy spokesman told Reuters last week that Russia was now using new cheaply-produced drones to film the location of Ukraine's air defences, assess damage and to act as decoys.

Serhiy Popko, head of Kyiv's military administration, said the latest drone attack was the seventh conducted against the city in July.

No civilian or critical infrastructure took a direct hit, but debris damaged the roofs, windows and facades of 13 private residences in the region, authorities said.

Some 11,500 residents sheltered for safety in metro stations in the night as the drones came in several waves from "all possible directions," city authorities said.

Belarusian Hajun, an opposition group that monitors military activity in Belarus, said that at least five Russian drones had flown into Belarusian airspace during the attack and that Minsk had scrambled a fighter jet in the evening.

Minsk, a close Kremlin ally, has not publicly commented on any such incident. Ukrainian military analysts have said Russia may fly drones via Belarus to minimise their flight time in Ukrainian airspace - and exposure to air defences - before they strike.

The Ukrainian air force also intercepted a Kh-59 missile fired at the southern region of Mykolaiv, it said. Local authorities had not reported any damage there as of Wednesday morning.

There was no immediate comment from Russia.

Kyiv and most of central and eastern Ukraine were under air raid alerts from 2000 GMT on Tuesday. Air defence systems were engaged on the approaches to Kyiv and the region outside the region several times in the night, Popko said.

Reuters reporters heard numerous blasts that sounded like air defence systems engaging targets.

(Reporting by Anastasiia Malenko and Pavel Polityuk in Kyiv, Yuliia Dysa in Gdansk, Lidia Kelly in Melbourne; Editing by Tom Balmforth and Conor Humphries)