Russian businesses tell Putin they will fund their own air defences after surge in Ukrainian drone attacks

Russian businesses are prepared to finance the purchase of heavier weapons and electronic systems to defend their plants from drone attacks, the head of Russia's most powerful business lobby has told President Vladimir Putin.

The proposal follows a surge in Ukrainian drone attacks this year, which have targeted Russian industry, including oil refineries, storage facilities, fertiliser plants, and ports.

According to remarks posted on the Kremlin's official website, Alexander Shokhin said that companies require "not only light weapons of 7.62 caliber, but also larger ones, including various electronic warfare systems, laser installations and other calibers".

He added: "Businesses are ready to finance all this work, but a mechanism is needed where financing schemes are clear. This could be a fund of some sort or another form of targeted financing."

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The government has already authorised private security companies guarding industrial sites to use 7.62 calibre automatic rifles, such as the AK-47, and allowed reservists to be drafted into local protection units.

However, Mr Shokhin complained to Mr Putin that, despite the decision to use reservists, these units were being shifted between sites too often, weakening their defences.

He also requested a deferral of penalties for companies facing delays in tax and other payments to the state budget while they repair facilities damaged during the attacks.

Meanwhile, Russia said on Monday that it intended to launch "systematic strikes" on targets in Kyiv linked to the Ukrainian military as well as decision-making centres, and urged foreigners to leave, a day after one of its heaviest bombardments of the city since the start of the war.

But Ukrainian ⁠Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha urged Kyiv's allies not to give in to "Russian blackmail." And the head of the EU mission in the city said the 27-nation bloc was "not going anywhere."

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Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, according to a Russian Foreign Ministry statement, that the impending strikes were "in response to the continuing terrorist attacks by the Kyiv regime" against civilians in Russia.

The statement said Russia's armed forces "are starting systematic strikes on facilities located in Kyiv that are used for the needs of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, as ⁠well as on centres where the corresponding decisions are being made."

An earlier Russian Foreign Ministry ​statement ⁠urged foreigners, including diplomats, to leave Kyiv as quickly as possible.

Russia has cited what it describes as a deliberate drone strike last Friday on a student dorm in the Russian-controlled Luhansk region of eastern Ukraine.

Ukraine's military denied the Russian accusations and said it had struck an elite drone command ⁠unit in the area.

In Kyiv, rescuers tackled the aftermath of Sunday's strikes, which authorities said had killed two people and injured 91.

Moscow fired ​an Oreshnik hypersonic ⁠missile near Kyiv - its third use of the nuclear-capable weapon ‌in more than four years of war.

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