Ukraine claims to down three Russian fighter-bomber jets

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy and military officials said the country’s forces shot down three Russian Su-34 fighter-bomber aircraft on Friday on the southern front, hailing it as a success in the 22-month-old war.

The Russian military made no mention of the incident. But Russian bloggers acknowledged the loss, and analysts suggested US-supplied Patriot missiles had probably been used.

Reuters could not independently confirm the reports.

“Today at noon in the southern sector -minus three Russian Su-34 fighter-bombers,” Ukrainian air force commander Mykola Oleshchuk wrote on the Telegram messaging app.

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Air Force spokesman Yuri Ihnat described it on national television as a “brilliantly planned operation”.

“There haven’t been Su-34s for some time in our positive statistics,” he said, citing the model as one of Russia’s most modern aircraft for bombing and other assaults.

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Mr Zelenskiy in his nightly video address praised the Odesa region anti-aircraft unit for downing the planes in Kherson region.

The region was occupied in the first days of Moscow's February 2022 invasion. Ukrainian forces have sought to regain territory and in November established positions on the eastern bank of the Dnipro river in Kherson.

Eurasia Daily, a Russian-based journal, said the Ukrainian account was plausible. Kyiv could have launched Patriot missiles, which have a range of up to 160km (100 miles) against high-altitude targets, from the western side of the Dnipro river, it said.

Ukrainian aviation expert Valeriy Romanenko told Ukrainian NV Radio he believed Patriot missiles most likely downed the Russian jets.

“This was a situation there the Russians were ... dropping up to 100 bombs in the south. Three were flying together and got caught. They didn’t quite take into account that the Patriot has a range of 160km for aerodynamic targets,” Mr Romanenko said.

Ukrainian successes have become less frequent since its forces made lightning gains a year ago in retaking Russian-held territory in the northeast and in the south.

A counteroffensive launched in the east and south in June has had limited progress. Mr Zelenskiy acknowledges that gains have been slower than hoped but has dismissed assertions by the military commander in chief, general Valerii Zaluzhnyi, that the war has entered a phase of “attrition” requiring a change in tactics.

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Ukrainian police have meanwhile arrested a senior Defense Ministry official on suspicions that he embezzled nearly $40 million (€36 million) as part of a fraudulent purchase of artillery shells for Ukraine’s military.

Ukrainian authorities have been working to clean up the ministry since reports of graft and financial mismanagement led to the removal in September of the minister at the time. Ukraine’s security service announced the arrest of the senior official, whose name was not released, on Friday.

Mr Zelenskiy has made tackling corruption one of his key wartime goals, not only to reassure Ukraine’s western allies that their billions of dollars in aid are not being siphoned off, but also to ensure an efficient allocation of resources as the country’s military runs short on weapons and ammunition in its fight to fend off Russia’s forces. – New York Times/Reuters

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