A huge kamikaze drone explosion hit close to Vladimir Putin‘s war command headquarters in Rostov-on-Don in the early hours of the morning. 

Shocking footage shows a giant fireball rising up over the city, which lies near Russian-occupied Ukraine.

The explosion whipped up a savage blaze in the vicinity of the military HQ, which Putin is reported to have visited several times throughout the war. 

Three buildings and several cars were damaged according to an initial assessment by Rostov region governor Vasily Golubev.

The war command bunker is at the HQ of Russia‘s Southern Military District in Rostov-on-Don.

It was here in June that slain Wagner warlord Yevgeny Prigozhin began his attempted coup against Putin’s regime, later staging a march towards Moscow.

Residents expressed shock at the attack and 20 blocks of flats on Pushkinskaya Street were left without electricity.

A state of emergency was declared in the centre of the city due to the kamikaze drone strike.

Reports said 99 residents were given hot food and offered to leave their homes.

As has become routine, Russian officials claimed a drone targeting in the city centre had been shot down, but it was unclear whether the drone managed to evade air defences.

Another drone came down outside the city.

‘At about 3am an air defence system went off in Rostov-on-Don,’ said Golubev.

‘An unmanned aerial vehicle was shot down. The consequences on the ground are being clarified.’

Later he said: ‘At the site of the UAV crash… an emergency mode was introduced from 9am. 99 people live in these three blocks. Meals will be organised for them.’

Putin used the war command post in Rostov as a backdrop for his New Year message to Russians in 2023, posing with troops.

Some seven kamikaze drones in total attacked Russian targets during the night. 

One – allegedly a Ukrainian Beaver drone capable of flying up to 620 miles – hit Ramenskoye near Moscow, close to Zhukovsky international airport.

The Russian authorities claimed they had shot it down, causing damage to a high rise residential building.

The attack triggered the closure of air space in Moscow, causing major flight disruption at the city’s four international airports.

The capital’s mayor Sergey Sobyanin said: ‘Tonight in the Ramenskoye urban district, air defence forces thwarted an attempted drone attack on Moscow.’

The railway station in Bryansk – capital of a region bordering Ukraine – was also damaged by a drone attack.

Laughter echoed through the House of Representatives Wednesday when Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene called for decorum while temporarily presiding over the chamber.

Greene, a far-right representative of Georgia known for outbursts towards her Democratic colleagues and President Biden himself, called for decorum during a floor speech.

As House Majority Leader Steve Scalise spoke, Greene said ‘members are reminded to abide by the decorum of the House’ in an effort to quiet down her colleagues across the aisle.

Instead of changing their tones to whispers, however, Greene’s call was met with boisterous laughter, which prompted the congresswoman to repeatedly bang her gavel.

Greene’s ignored call for composure comes months after she heckled President Joe Biden during the State of the Union when she shouted ‘Liar!’ after he claimed Republicans hoped to threaten Social Security.

At last year’s SOTU, she and Representative Lauren Boebert of Colorado chanted ‘Build the Wall’ as the president spoke about immigration.

In a recent Homeland Security committee meeting, MTG branded Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas a ‘liar,’ after he said his agency is fighting the drug trafficking taking place at the US southern border.

Ultimately, the Republican committee chairman, Representative Mark Green, moved to strike MTG’s labeling of Mayorkas from the record.

Democratic congressman Jimmy Gomez responded to the video of Green calling for decorum by writing that MTG ‘calling for decorum is like Leonardo DiCaprio telling people to date people their own age.’

Representative Adam Schiff tweeted: ‘I haven’t laughed this hard in a while – but Marjorie Taylor Greene just called for “decorum” on the House Floor.’

During Greene’s first congressional term, she was kicked off the House Budget and Education and Labor committees by the Democrat-controlled chamber.

Her colleagues, in a mostly party-line vote, opted to remove her from her freshman committee placements following the revelation of a number of conspiracy theories she’d shared on subjects ranging from the September 11 attacks and school shootings to the Clintons.

Though she apologized for her remarks, and stated unequivocally that ‘9/11 absolutely happened’ and ‘school shootings are absolutely real,’ the vote went against her, with nearly a dozen members of her party voting with the Democrats to remove her from committees.

Following the vote, Greene shared how she was feeling with her followers and critics. 

‘I woke up early this morning literally laughing thinking about what a bunch of morons the Democrats (+11) are for giving someone like me free time,’ Greene posted.

‘In this Democrat tyrannical government, Conservative Republicans have no say on committees anyway. Oh this is going to be fun!’

She went on to win her reelection campaign by a commanding margin.