Kiev air defenses fail to cope with Russia’s new strikes — Le Monde

PARIS, July 12. /TASS/. Air defenses of Ukraine’s capital Kiev are failing to cope with new Russian attacks, France’s Le Monde newspaper wrote.

According to the report, none of Russia’s ballistic missiles reportedly fired at the Ukrainian capital on July 6 was intercepted. The same applies to the July 11 launch.

The report quoted a Ukrainian colonel as saying that the failures were due to a lack of Patriot air defense systems and interceptor missiles.

Russian jet-powered unmanned aerial vehicles present a particularly difficult target for Ukrainian air defenses because they fly at high altitudes and at high speeds and are therefore very hard to intercept, Le Monde wrote.

US President Donald Trump announced during the recent NATO summit in Turkey’s Ankara that Washington would grant Ukraine the license to produce Patriot missile systems. However, Bloomberg reported that implementing this plan will be neither quick nor easy, nor will it allow Ukraine to quickly replenish its arsenals.