Moscow oil refinery struck in Ukraine’s biggest air raid on city since start of war

0:56 Ukrainian drones hit oil refinery and residential building in Moscow – video Moscow oil refinery struck in Ukraine’s biggest air raid on city since start of war Kyiv says attack, which also forced evacuation at Russia’s biggest airport, was in response to strike on historic monastery Explainer: how significant was attack on Moscow? Ukrainian drones have hit several locations across Moscow in Kyiv’s biggest air raid on the city since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion, setting a major ⁠oil refinery on fire and forcing evacuations at the country’s largest airport. Volodymyr Zelenskyy described the attack as a response to Russia’s strike on a historic Kyiv monastery complex earlier this week. “We do not want this war and never did,” the Ukrainian president said in a voice message to journalists. “But if Ukraine is going to burn, your Moscow will burn too … It is time to end the aggression, time to end this war.” Russia’s foreign minister in turn announced it would launch huge “group strikes” on Ukraine “on a regular basis” in response to the Moscow raid. The scale of Ukraine’s long-range attack, apparently designed to shut down operations at the key oil refinery in the Kapotnya area, caught most people by surprise in a city that does not typically warn residents with air raid alarms, and prompted panicked messages on social media. According to reports, many residents in Moscow’s outlying suburbs learned of the attack only when they saw drones flying overhead. “No SMS at all, no sirens. All the information is in local chats – there’s a lot more there than on TV,” a Moscow resident said in a message to the independent, foreign-based Russian news site Meduza. Footage posted online showed three plumes of smoke rising from the Kapotnya refinery. The strike was the second in two days on the facility, which local authorities claimed injured at least 17 people, including two children. The refinery, one of Moscow’s most important energy facilities, supplies up to 40% of the capital’s petrol and about 50% of its diesel fuel. A black plume of smoke rises over Moscow oil refinery after Ukrainian drone attack Russia said its ⁠air defence systems ​intercepted and ⁠destroyed 555 Ukrainian drones over ⁠multiple ​regions ‌overnight. The number actually shot down could not be independently confirmed. Vladimir Putin is in Kazan, 430 miles (700km) east of Moscow, hosting leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations as Russia seeks to bolster business and other ties. Kyiv was hit this week by a major strike of ballistic missiles and drones in a marked escalation of the air war. Putin had warned of impending “systemic strikes” on Ukraine. The Moscow attack came hours after Zelenskyy said he had held “an important coordination call” with the presidents of the US and France and had won vital pledges of further support from this week’s international G7 summit. European leaders are optimistic about Ukraine’s prospects. Ahead of a summit on Thursday eveni