Vladimir Putin has reportedly opted to steer clear of Moscow as Ukrainian drones continue to pound the Russian capital.
The Russian president has seemingly fled east where he is thought to be beyond the reach of the surging drone attacks, according to a report from independent Telegram channel Mozhem Obyasnit.
“Putin has fled beyond the Urals,” the channel wrote, translated from Russian. “Following an intensification of Ukrainian attacks, his public itinerary has increasingly shifted toward Siberia and the Russian Far East, even as the Kremlin continues to present closed-door meetings with a ‘Moscow’ dateline.”
The Russian leader, increasingly paranoid about potential threats from both outside and within his own orbit, is said to have tried to conceal his whereabouts during a recent trip to Novosibirsk in which he used a decoy plane. Residents living along his motorcade route were even ordered to remain indoors during his visit to the city, according to independent outlet Novaya Gazeta.
The reporting comes as Ukrainian forces launched a massive drone assault on the Russian capital overnight on Sunday, according to The Moscow Times.
Moscow’s provincial governor Andrei Vorobyov said on Telegram that an 83-year-old man had been killed as a result of the strikes, and several more were injured as drones struck a warehouse belonging to Russia’s largest online retailer, Wildberries, in Podolsk.
Ukraine has been targeting Wildberries, the Russian equivalent of Amazon, as a way to damage Russia’s economic infrastructure. Kyiv has also accused the retailer of selling supplies to aid Russia’s military campaign.
The Russian Defense Ministry said it had downed 822 Ukrainian drones, the Moscow Times reported.
Even Putin’s own allies are admitting that his war is flailing.
Andrei Klepach, chief economist at Vnesheconombank and a former Putin appointee, offered a bleak assessment of the current status of the war during a forum in the nation’s capital, The Moscow Times reported.
“We’re falling behind,” Klepach was quoted as saying. “We’re losing both the technological and economic competition globally. And, as I’ve already said, we’re losing not only to China and the U.S., but in some ways, we’re losing to Ukraine.”
“We won’t win the competition in this war of attrition,” he added. “We’re under the illusion that everything will collapse. It hasn’t, and it won’t. Our costs are mounting.”
Klepach was fired within days of his comments going public, according to multiple local media reports.
The Russian president has defied criticisms of his war and vowed to double down, recently embarking on a charm offensive to counter the negative polling he’s received. He’s visited several cities throughout Siberia to promote the war effort he said nearly five years ago would only be a brief “special military operation.”
