Russia has carried out large-scale deadly strikes on residential buildings and energy infrastructure across Ukraine, cutting power to several Kyiv districts as Moscow intensifies its air campaign ahead of winter.
The Russian missile and drone strikes overnight on Wednesday killed at least 24 people and damaged residential buildings and energy infrastructure in 12 Ukrainian regions, according to Volodymyr Zelenskyy and local authorities.
The Ukrainian president said energy infrastructure was among Russia’s main targets, with “emergency” power cuts affecting several districts in the Ukrainian capital, according to the country’s energy ministry. It said the shutdowns were due to Russia’s attacks and urged people to avoid overloading the energy system.
“One of the key targets was our energy infrastructure. The Russians wanted to strike painfully and demonstratively,” Zelenskyy said.
Video description
Russian missile and drone strikes hit Kyiv on Wednesday
The attacks came hours after Zelenskyy, in his nightly address on Tuesday, warned of an impending large-scale attack. Last week, he told the FT in an interview in a school hit by a drone that Russian President Vladimir Putin had instructed his military to escalate air strikes on civilians and critical infrastructure because his army had failed to achieve its military goals on the battlefield.
Two people were killed in Kyiv and 18 in the city of Pryluky, about 150km east of the capital, where a Russian strike destroyed a five-storey apartment complex, according to Zelenskyy and regional authorities. First responders recovered the bodies of four children from the site — three infants and an 8-year-old boy — Ukraine’s state emergency service reported. Dozens more people were wounded in the Pryluky strike, with emergency crews continuing to search for survivors under the rubble.
Russian missile and drone strikes also damaged five apartment buildings in Dnipro to the south-east and four high-rise buildings in central Kremenchuk, killing two people and injuring eight, Zelenskyy said. A drone damaged a high-rise building in nearby Zaporizhzhia. Two more people were killed in Oleksandriya, according to the Ukrainian president.
Russia fired 70 missiles and 130 explosive drones, of which almost a third were jet-powered, according to the Ukrainian air force. It said it shot down 44 missiles and 117 drones.
Russian ballistic missiles remain the most difficult to intercept, Zelenskyy said, calling air defences, particularly US-made Patriot interceptor missiles, “a vital necessity”.
Russia’s defence ministry said the military had targeted industrial facilities involved in the production and storage of Ukraine’s Flamingo cruise missiles and drones. It said ports and shipping facilities in the Odesa region were also struck in the overnight attacks.
Noting that Putin turned 74 on Wednesday, Ukrainian foreign minister Andriy Sybiha wrote on X: “On Putin’s birthday, Russian generals brought him his favourite present: war crimes.” Deliberately targeting civilian infrastructure is a war crime according to international law.
Sybiha urged Ukraine’s western partners to tighten sanctions against Moscow’s military-industrial complex and deliver “stronger support for Ukraine, including all kinds of air defence and energy assistance ahead of winter”.
Zelenskyy told the FT on Thursday last week that he had asked US President Donald Trump to impose sanctions on Russian and Chinese companies that the Ukrainian president said were involved in developing Moscow’s Rassvet satellite network, a rival to Elon Musk’s Starlink.