Attempted drone attack on Moscow, Ukraine to receive first Abrams tanks in September, protests in Georgia’s Batumi over cruise ship with Russian tourists aboard

The Ukraine war has been raging on for 519 days. A drone attempted to attack Moscow. Authorities reported a downed UAV, no one was injured, no damages were caused.

An oil depot caught fire following a missile strike on occupied Shakhtarsk, Ukraine’s Donetsk region.

The US is hoping that first Abrams tanks will arrive in Ukraine in September, Politico reports.

Georgia’s Batumi protesting over a cruise ship with Russian tourists on board. The ship has already left the port.

Lutfie Zudieva, journalist for Ukraine’s Graty detained in Crimea, has been fined €120.

Novaya-Europe presents a round-up of the main events that occurred overnight on 28 July. 

Moscow mayor, Defence Ministry on drone in Moscow

Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin reported that an “enemy drone” attempted an attack on the Russian capital in the early hours of 28 July. The UAV was downed by Defence Ministry forces. No one was injured, no damages were caused, the mayor added.

The Russian Defence Ministry also reported about the intercepted drone, which was attempting to strike facilities in the Moscow region. The ministry labelled it as a “terrorist attack”, saying that no injuries or damages were inflicted.

This is the third attempted drone attack on Moscow in the past month. Two more UAVs attacked Moscow on 24 July. One drone crashed into a business centre, the other fell close to the Russian Defence Ministry’s cluster of buildings. Sobyanin then said that there were “no serious damage or injuries”. On 4 July, the Defence Ministry reported that four UAVs were downed by air-defence systems in Greater Moscow.

Oil depot on fire in Shakhtarsk following missile strike

An oil depot has caught fire in occupied Shakhtarsk (Ukraine’s Donetsk region) following a missile strike. ZvezdaNews reports that police and Emergency Ministry staffers are working at the site.

The fire was successfully localised, only one of the tanks is still on fire. No one was killed or injured. The new outlet claims that a Ukrainian missile is believed to have caused it.

The city administration also reported the fire caused by the missile strike via VK, a Russian social media platform.

Politico: Ukraine to receive first Abrams tanks in September

The US is expecting that Kyiv will receive the first Abrams tanks to be used in battles in September, Politico reports, citing sources. Earlier plans placed these deliveries towards the end of 2023.

Washington will send older Abrams models — M1A1 instead of more advanced M1A2 — to Ukraine. Several tanks are planned to be exported to Germany in August for final renovations and modernisation (in particular, their secret depleted uranium armour will be removed). As soon as this process is completed, the first batch of Abrams tanks will head to Ukraine.

According to Politico, the first shipment will contain 6-8 tanks, while the US in total wants to send 31 tanks to Ukraine (equal to one Ukrainian tank battalion).

Ukrainian service members are meant to undergo a 10-week training course on these 31 tanks in Germany before Abrams can be used in the war. According to a Pentagon source, Ukrainian soldiers are expected to complete the course in August.

Georgia’s Batumi protesting over cruise ship with Russian tourists aboard

Astoria Grand, a cruise ship with Russian tourists on board, arrived from Sochi to Georgia’s Batumi early on 27 July. A protest rally began near the port in the evening of the same day, when the tourists were heading back to the ship, News Georgia reports.

People were protesting against Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and were unhappy with the responses some of the passengers told Georgian reporters.

Ekho Kavkaza, for instance, quotes one of the cruise ship passengers who was asked if she knew that Georgian territories were occupied by Russia.

“Russia is not an occupant, did we occupy you really? We were liberating Abkhazia from you. They asked us to help them, you drove tanks in there. I was in Abkhazia and I saw windows smashed in all the buildings,” she responded.

Another tourist said: “We are the Soviet Union. We are one country”.

Georgia’s maritime transport agency said that the ship flies the Palau flag and is serviced by Miray Cruises International, a Turkish cruise company. The Georgian authorities also said that the ship’s arrival was of commercial nature. It is registered in the Seychelles and is not placed under international sanctions.

Astoria Grande left Batumi late on 27 July.

Lutfie Zudieva, Graty reporter detained in Crimea, fined €120

A Crimea court has fined Lutfie Zudieva, a reporter for Ukraine’s Graty, for 12,000 rubles (€120) for “participation in mass simultaneous presence of citizens in a public place”, Graty reports.

Along with her, 12 more Crimean Tatars were detained after they arrived at a court building to support their relatives. Three of the detainees were also fined, while journalist Kulameta Ibraimova was arrested for five days.

Zudieva travelled to the courthouse for job duties, which she tried to prove to the police officers, but was detained nonetheless. At the police station, law enforcers tried to intimidate her into providing fingerprints and saliva samples. Zudieva refused to do so.