MOSCOW: Russia downed a barrage of 42 Ukrainian drones near Crimea, Moscow’s defense ministry said Friday, in the largest recent air attack on the peninsula and a day after Kyiv claimed a special forces raid on the territory.
Crimea, annexed by Russia in 2014, has been targeted by Kyiv throughout Moscow’s Ukraine offensive but has come under more intense, increased attacks in recent weeks.
Nine drones were “destroyed... over the territory of the Republic of Crimea,” the defense ministry wrote on Telegram early Friday.
Thirty-three others “were suppressed by electronic warfare and crashed without reaching the target,” it said, without specifying whether there had been any damage or casualties.
Earlier, a local Russian-installed official said several drones had been destroyed over the sea off Crimea’s Cape Khersones.
The cape is located in the southwest of the peninsula near Sevastopol, which is home to Russia’s Black Sea fleet.
Emergency services reported no damage to civilian infrastructure from those drones, Sevastopol governor Mikhail Razvozhayev wrote on Telegram.
It was not clear whether they were included in the 42 reported by the defense ministry.
“All forces and services are in a state of combat readiness,” Razvozhayev said.
Kyiv has repeatedly said it plans to take Crimea back.
In recent weeks it has targeted Russian infrastructure on the peninsula with barrages of up to 28 aerial drones.
On Thursday, Ukraine said its forces had landed on the peninsula and flown the country’s flag during a “special operation” to mark its second wartime Independence Day.
Special forces troops had landed overnight on Crimea’s western shore near the towns of Olenivka and Mayak, where they had “engaged in combat,” Ukraine’s GUR intelligence agency said.
Moscow has also accused Ukraine of attacking the Russian-built Crimean bridge, which connects the peninsula to Russia.
The bridge has been closed due to multiple incidents including a massive explosion in October last year.
Reports of the aerial attack come as the Pentagon said it would begin training Ukrainian F-16 pilots in the United States starting next month.
The jets have long been sought by Kyiv, now bogged down in a plodding counter-offensive aimed at retaking land held by Russian forces.
US President Joe Biden and Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky spoke on Thursday about plans to train Ukrainian pilots to fly F-16 fighter jets, the White House said.
Earlier, Biden had said he was “not surprised” at news that Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the Wagner mercenary group and who led a brief mutiny against Russia’s military, may have died in a plane crash.
“I don’t know for a fact what happened, but I’m not surprised,” Biden said.
Putin broke his silence Thursday on news of the crash, paying a qualified tribute to the mercenary boss and the paramilitary group he led.
“He was a man of complicated fate, and he made serious mistakes in his life, but he achieved the right results,” Putin said.
Air defense systems destroyed a Ukrainian missile over Kaluga region, Moscow’s defense ministry said Friday.
Kaluga borders the Moscow region, which has been targeted by a barrage of Ukrainian drone attacks in recent days after Kyiv vowed to “return” the conflict to Russia.
Flights to and from Moscow’s Vnukovo and Domodedovo airports were briefly halted, the TASS news agency reported Friday, citing aviation services and without specifying why.
Russia destroys 42 Ukrainian-launched drones over Crimea
https://arab.news/ysu65
Russia destroys 42 Ukrainian-launched drones over Crimea
- No damage to civilian infrastructure reported
Second doctor in Matthew Perry overdose case sentenced to home confinement
- Dr. Mark Chavez, 55, a onetime San Diego-based physician, pleaded guilty in federal court in October
- Judge Sherilyn Peace Garnett also sentenced Chavez to 300 hours of community service
LOS ANGELES: A second California doctor was sentenced on Tuesday to eight months of home confinement for illegally supplying “Friends” star Matthew Perry with ketamine, the powerful sedative that caused the actor’s fatal drug overdose in a hot tub in 2023.
Dr. Mark Chavez, 55, a onetime San Diego-based physician, pleaded guilty in federal court in October to a single felony count of conspiracy to distribute the prescription anesthetic and surrendered his medical license in November.
Judge Sherilyn Peace Garnett also sentenced Chavez to 300 hours of community service. As part of his plea agreement, Chavez admitted to selling ketamine to another physician Dr. Salvador Plasencia, 44, who in turn supplied the drug to Perry, though not the dose that ultimately killed the performer. Plasencia, who pleaded guilty to four counts of unlawful drug distribution, was sentenced earlier this month to 2 1/2 years behind bars.
He and Chavez were the first two of five people convicted in connection with Perry’s ketamine-induced death to be sent off to prison.
The three others scheduled to be sentenced in the coming weeks — Jasveen Sangha, 42, a drug dealer known as the “Ketamine Queen;” a go-between dealer Erik Fleming, 56; and Perry’s former personal assistant, Iwamasa, 60.
Sangha admitted to supplying the ketamine dose that killed Perry, and Iwamasa acknowledged injecting Perry with it. It was Iwamasa who later found Perry, aged 54, face down and lifeless, in the jacuzzi of his Los Angeles home on October 28, 2023.
An autopsy report concluded the actor died from the acute effects of ketamine,” which combined with other factors in causing him to lose consciousness and drown.
Perry had publicly acknowledged decades of substance abuse, including the years he starred as Chandler Bing on the hit 1990s NBC television series “Friends.”
According to federal law enforcement officials, Perry had been receiving ketamine infusions for treatment of depression and anxiety at a clinic where he became addicted to the drug.
When doctors there refused to increase his dosage, he turned to unscrupulous providers elsewhere willing to exploit Perry’s drug dependency as a way to make quick money, authorities said. Ketamine is a short-acting anesthetic with hallucinogenic properties that is sometimes prescribed to treat depression and other psychiatric disorders. It also has seen widespread abuse as an illicit party drug.
