Ukraine cites success in downing drones as Kyiv and Moscow trade 'dirty bomb' accusations

Ukrainian authorities tried to dampen public fears over Russia's use of Iranian drones by claiming increasing success Monday in shooting them down, while the Kremlin's talk of a possible "dirty bomb" attack has added another worrying dimension as the war enters its ninth month.

Ukrainians are bracing for less electric power this winter following a sustained Russian barrage on their infrastructure in recent weeks. Citizens in the southern Ukrainian city of Mykolaiv lined up for water and essential supplies as Ukrainian forces continued their advance on the nearby Russian-occupied city of Kherson.

Ukraine's forces have shot down more than two-thirds of the approximately 330 Shahed drones that Russia has fired through Saturday, the head of Ukraine's intelligence service, Kyrylo Budanov, said in an interview Monday. Budanov said Russia's military had ordered about 1,700 various types of drones, and is rolling out a second batch of about 300 Shaheds.

"Terror with the use of Shaheds can actually last for a long time," he was quoted as saying in Ukrainska Pravda newspaper. "Air defence is basically coping, 70 per cent are shot down."

Both Russia and Iran deny that any Iranian-built drones have been used in the war, but the triangle-shaped Shahed-136s have rained down on civilians in Kyiv and elsewhere in Ukraine.

Britain's Ministry of Defence, in an intelligence update on Twitter, said Russia was likely to use a large number of the drones to try to penetrate "increasingly effective Ukrainian air defences" — in part to substitute for Russian-made long-range precision weapons "which are becoming increasingly scarce."

That assessment came on top of a stark warning by Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu to key British, French, Turkish and U.S. counterparts over the weekend that Ukrainian forces were preparing a "provocation" involving a radioactive device — a so-called "dirty bomb." Britain, France, and the United States rejected that claim as "transparently false."

A dirty bomb uses explosives to scatter radioactive waste in an effort to sow terror. Such weapons don't have the devastating destruction of a nuclear explosion, but could expose broad areas to radioactive contamination.

Russian authorities on Monday doubled down on Shoigu's warning.

Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov, head of the Russian military's radiation, chemical and biological protection forces, said Russian military assets were on high readiness for possible radioactive contamination. He told reporters a "dirty bomb" blast could contaminate thousands of square kilometres and spew deadly radiation up to 1,500 kilometres.

At a news conference Monday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the suspicion was not unfounded. "We have serious reasons to believe that such things could be planned."

Ukraine has rejected Moscow's claims and said it is an attempt to distract from Russia's own plans to detonate a dirty bomb. German Defence Minister Christine Lambrecht on Monday dismissed as "outrageous" the claim that Ukraine could use a dirty bomb, saying there were "zero indications" of that.

The White House on Monday again underscored that the Russian allegations were false.

"It's just not true. We know it's not true," John Kirby, a spokesperson for the National Security Council, said. "In the past, the Russians have, on occasion, blamed others for things that they were planning to do."