What the Moscow drone attack and EU sanctions showed

What did the events around 22 September 2026 say about the pressure being applied to Russia? Two developments in the preceding days pointed in different directions: a large Ukrainian strike on Moscow Oblast, and a European Union sanctions deal that began to unravel.

The strike on Moscow Oblast

On 20 September 2026, Ukrainian forces launched a massive drone attack on Moscow Oblast, with more than 1,600 long-range drones sent from Ukraine. At least two people were killed and hundreds more were evacuated. Moscow Refinery was on fire after several direct hits.

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirmed that he had ordered the attack. He described it as a response to Russian forces targeting civilians in Ukrainian cities, and said FP-5 Flamingo cruise missiles and ballistic missiles had also been used.

The target fits a pattern. Attacks inside Russia since the full-scale invasion of 24 February 2022 have mainly hit the military, the arms industry and the oil industry, and many have been drone strikes. The scale reported on 20 September, with drones alongside cruise and ballistic missiles, and with a refinery among the sites hit, placed the attack in that pattern.

Sanctions: agreement, then a block

On 21 September 2026, European Union ambassadors agreed in principle to remove Russian oligarchs Mikhail Fridman and Alisher Usmanov from sanctions imposed over Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The same agreement renewed restrictions on about 3,000 other Russian-linked individuals and entities for three years. Latvia later blocked the deal.

The episode shows how sanctions depend on agreement among member states. The ambassadors had reached a position, but the later Latvian block meant that the package, including the proposed delistings, did not go through as agreed.

Two tracks, one war

The two developments sit on different tracks. One is military, carried out by Ukraine with its own long-range weapons against targets in Russia. The other is economic and political, run through European institutions that have to reconcile the positions of many governments. Sanctions of this kind were imposed by many countries and organisations after Russia's annexation of Crimea began in 2014, and they have continued through the wider war that began in 2022.

By 22 September 2026, the picture was therefore mixed. Ukraine had shown it could strike Moscow Oblast in very large numbers, and said it had done so in response to attacks on civilians. In Europe, a long renewal of sanctions on thousands of targets had been agreed in principle, but one contested part of the deal ran into a national veto.