By Tom Balmforth and Dan Peleschuk
KYIV (Reuters) -Russia unleashed its largest wave of airstrikes on Ukraine in nearly three months on Sunday, firing 120 missiles and 90 drones in a sweeping assault that killed at the least seven folks and induced “severe damage” to the facility system, officers mentioned.
Ukrainians have been bracing for weeks for an assault on the hobbled power system, fearing crippling harm that will trigger lengthy blackouts as winter units in and ramp up psychological strain at a essential second within the warfare launched by Russia in February 2022.
The strikes, which prompted emergency energy cuts in quite a few areas, got here after this month’s U.S. presidential election victory of Donald Trump, whose pledge to finish the warfare with out saying how has raised the prospect of a looming push to carry negotiations.
“Russia launched one of the largest air attacks: drones and missiles against peaceful cities, sleeping civilians, critical infrastructure,” Overseas Minister Andrii Sybiha wrote on X.
Air defences may very well be heard participating drones over the capital within the night time, and a sequence of highly effective blasts rang out throughout the town centre because the missile assault was below manner within the morning.
Kyiv’s air pressure mentioned the army had destroyed 104 out of 120 missiles fired and 42 out of 90 drones launched by Russia.
Russia’s defence ministry mentioned it had launched a large strike on power services that provide Ukraine’s military-industrial advanced.
“Severe damage to Ukraine’s energy system, including to DTEK power stations. These attacks again highlight Ukraine’s need for additional air defence systems from our allies,” mentioned Maxim Timchenko, CEO of DTEK which is Ukraine’s largest personal power supplier.
After repeated Russian assaults on the facility grid, officers reveal little concerning the state of the power infrastructure and rarely launch detailed data on the result of strikes.
Officers confirmed harm to “critical infrastructure” or reported energy cuts in areas spanning from Volyn, Rivne, Lviv within the west to the southeastern Dnipropetrovsk and Zaporizhzhia areas. DTEK imposed emergency energy cuts within the southern Odesa area on the order of power officers.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy mentioned the “massive combined attack targeted all regions of Ukraine”.
In Mykolaiv within the south, two folks have been killed in an in a single day drone assault, the governor mentioned. Two folks died and three have been wounded in a strike on a rail depot within the Dnipropetrovsk area, rail authorities mentioned.
In Lviv area, on the border with Poland, a girl in a automobile was killed, the governor mentioned. One other two folks have been killed within the Odesa area.
In Kyiv, the roof of a residential constructing caught fireplace on account of falling particles and at the least two folks have been damage, metropolis officers mentioned on the Telegram messaging app.
The massive wave of strikes happened because the warfare approaches this week’s 1,000th day since Russia’s full-scale invasion.
Russia final performed a significant missile strike on Kyiv on Aug. 26, when officers mentioned it fired a salvo of greater than 200 drones and missiles throughout the nation, killing seven folks.
MOUNTING PRESSURE
NATO member Poland, which borders Ukraine to the west, mentioned it had scrambled its air pressure inside its airspace as a safety precaution throughout the assault, which it mentioned used cruise missiles, ballistic missiles and drones.
Russia’s onslaught piles extra strain on Ukraine as Moscow’s troops notch up their quickest battlefield positive aspects within the east since 2022 of their effort to grab all the industrial Donbas area regardless of taking heavy losses, in accordance with Kyiv and the West.
Ukrainian troops are in the meantime making an attempt to carry an space of land that they seized in Russia’s Kursk area in August, one thing Kyiv has mentioned might function a bargaining chip additional down the road.
Sybiha mentioned the strike seemed to be Moscow’s “true response” to leaders interacting with President Vladimir Putin, an obvious swipe at German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who known as the Russian chief on Friday for the primary time since late 2022.
Although Scholz urged Putin to drag his troops out of Ukraine the place they occupy a fifth of the nation, Kyiv bridled on the truth of the decision, which it mentioned diminished the isolation of the Kremlin chief.
