Six killed in Kyiv as Russia hits Ukraine’s energy sector with missiles and drones
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Original article by Dan Sabbagh in Kyiv
Russia launched a massive missile and drone attack on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure overnight, killing six and injuring 14 in Kyiv as a fresh round of US-brokered peace negotiations began in Abu Dhabi.
A total of 22 missiles, including four hypersonic Kinzhals, and 464 drones, were fired by Russia in attacks that principally targeted Kyiv and the surrounding area, according to the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
“All partners must remember that lives need to be saved every single day,” the president said. “Weapons and air defence systems are important, as is the sanctions pressure on the aggressor. There can be no pauses in assistance.”
The Ukrainian leader said the Kremlin must not feel it was able to win the war while talks continued. He said: “What matters most now is that all partners move toward diplomacy together, through joint efforts. Pressure on Russia must deliver results.”
Zelenskyy said four drones had also crossed “into the airspace of our neighbours – Moldova and Romania”. Romania had deployed four fighter jets to track two drones early in the morning, its defence ministry said.
The widescale attacks came as reports emerged that a fresh round of US-brokered peace talks had begun on Monday night in the capital of the United Arab Emirates, with Dan Driscoll, the US army secretary, flying in to meet a Russian delegation and a Ukrainian team led by Kyrylo Budanov.
Four people were killed and three injured at one site in Kyiv’s Sviatoshynskyi district in the west, and two people were killed and five injured in the Dniprovskyi district. There were 13 separate reports of attack damage or falling debris including to a 22-storey residential apartment block.
Liubov Petrivna, a 90-year-old resident of a damaged building in the Dniprovskyi district, said “absolutely everything” in her apartment had been shattered by the strike and “glass rained down” on her. Petrivna told Associated Press she did not believe in the peace plan under discussion: “No one will ever do anything about it. Putin won’t stop until he finishes us off.”
Explosions were heard in two waves in the capital, first shortly after 1am, and again at about 7am, and also in the Dnipro, Kharkiv, Chernihiv and Cherkasy regions in a wide-ranging assault against the country’s already battered infrastructure.
Emergency power outages to Kyiv’s already disrupted service were announced by the Ukrenergo electricity generator, while heat supply was also affected in large parts of the capital on Tuesday morning as the city began a clear-up process.
“The Russians are deliberately targeting civilian infrastructure and housing. Cynical terror,” Tymur Tkachenko, the head of the military administration for the capital, said on Telegram.