Page 26 - RusRPTApr23

least 400 kilometres from Ukraine). A final drone was recovered near a gas compressor in the village of Gubastovo in Moscow Region.
The same day, airspace around Pulkovo airport in St. Petersburg was closed for about an hour without warning. The Russian authorities even scrambled fighter jets. The usually well-informed Petersburg media outlet Fontanka claimed an unidentified flying object was spotted about 180 kilometres from the city. Later, the Defence Ministry claimed that it was an air defence training drill.
A final incident on Belarus’s Machulishhi airfield on February 26 is also noteworthy. A civilian drone, apparently launched from inside Belarus, managed to damage a Russian A-50 spy plane (equivalent to the American AVACS). It isn’t clear how much damage was caused, but the plane reportedly had to fly to Russia for repairs.
While Russia has been getting used to drone attacks, a ground attack from over the Ukrainian border last week was a first in this war — and sparked real panic.
The attack took place on March 2 morning. At first, it seemed reminiscent of Russian false flag operations on the eve of the war. At 11:30 a.m. the governor of the Bryansk Region, which borders Ukraine, reported an attack — and wild rumors began to swirl: Telegram channelsclaimed a group of 50 to 100 saboteurs descended on a border village, shot up a school bus, blew up electricity and gas stations and took the entire village hostage, killing a schoolgirl. State-run news agencies cited sources that actively encouraged the rising fears.
Within a few hours, however, it became clear that this was a far smaller-scale incident affecting just two villages — Lyubechane and Sushany. The school bus turned out to be a private car in which three children were passengers. The driver of that Niva and another man were reportedly killed, and a 10-year-old boy was injured. Only one person was taken hostage (according to claims from anonymous local residents) and was later released. Nonetheless, the attack was real. This is confirmed not only by footage recorded in the villages by the “Russian Volunteer Corps”, which claimed responsibility for the attack, but also by eye-witness accounts from local residents who spoke with opposition media outlets.
In the evening, the Federal Security Service (FSB) reported that “Ukrainian nationalists were forced back to the territory of Ukraine and subjected to artillery fire.” Putin commented on the raid, but only briefly: he called the attackers terrorists.
The Russian Volunteer Corps, which claimed responsibility for the attacks, is little known — except to experts. The group was set up by a 38-year-old Russian neo-Nazi and football hooligan, Denis Nikitin, who moved to Ukraine in 2017. In an interview with the Financial Times, Nikitin said that 45 people took part in the raid last week, some of them members of a “guerrilla network” based in Russia, and that the attack was coordinated with the Ukrainian military.
26 RUSSIA Country Report Russia April 2023 www.intellinews.com