Destroyed 46 Ukrainian drones overnight: Russian defence

Moscow: The Russian defence ministry said on Tuesday that its air defence destroyed 46 Ukrainian drones overnight, and most of them were done over the Belgorod region near the border shared with Ukraine, Reuters reported.

The ministry informed the same on Telegram that 41 drones were destroyed over the Belgorod region and the rest over the territories of Bryansk, Kursk and Oryol region.

When a person got injured in the overnight attack, several houses were damaged, according to Belgorod regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov's statement on Telegram. Governor of the Bryansk region, Alexander Bogomaz, said there were no immediate reports of injuries or damages from the attack.

However, Kyiv made no immediate comment on the attack alleged by Russia. Kyiv has often said its strikes inside Russia aim to destroy infrastructure key to Moscow's war efforts and are in response to Russia's relentless, Reuters reported.

Meanwhile, Russia has rejected the possible deployment of NATO peacekeepers in Ukraine, suggesting unarmed observers or a civilian monitoring group be sent there to oversee a potential peace deal.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko stated that discussions on peacekeeping efforts in Ukraine are premature and should only happen after a formal peace agreement is in place.

Grushko emphasised that NATO's involvement in peacekeeping operations is fundamentally contradictory, the Xinhua news agency reported.

"NATO and peacekeeping are entirely incompatible. The real history of the alliance consists of military operations and unprovoked aggression to assert its global and regional dominance," he said.

Russia maintains that any deployment of NATO or EU forces in Ukraine, whether under a unified banner or individual national forces, would effectively draw them into the conflict zone, rendering them direct participants and exposing them to all the associated consequences.