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A major Russian missile and drone attack targeted the Ukrainian capital overnight as Moscow’s long-range strike campaign seeks to wreck Ukraine’s energy infrastructure.
Ukraine said six people had been killed and dozens injured in a bombardment that focused almost entirely on Kyiv — a departure from usual aerial attacks in which several regions are targeted by waves of Iranian-designed Geran drones as well as ballistic and cruise missiles.
“This was a deliberately calculated attack aimed at causing maximum harm to people and civilian infrastructure,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wrote on the social media platform X.
Zelenskyy said the US-made Patriot air defence systems “worked effectively” overnight, with Ukraine’s air force reporting that 14 of the 19 ballistic and cruise missiles launched overnight had been downed. Russia also used 430 drones in the attack.
Debris from an Iskander missile damaged the Azerbaijani embassy, according to the Ukrainian president.
Kyiv inhabitants rushed to underground shelters and metro stations at about midnight when several deafening explosions were heard in the capital, shaking windows and triggering car alarms. City authorities said at least 30 residential buildings across Kyiv were damaged during the attack, with emergency help points set up in five districts.
Footage from the attack showed several fires raging in the capital and the facades of apartment buildings pierced and blackened.
Ukrainian MP Danylo Hetmantsev wrote on Telegram that the attack had targeted energy infrastructure. Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko reported the city’s district heating system had suffered damage, with heating temporarily cut off in some buildings. The assault on Kyiv subsided at about 7am.
Russia has in recent weeks increasingly focused its long-range attacks on Ukraine’s energy system, pounding power plants and substations with devastating effect as temperatures start to drop across the country.
In a statement following a nationwide attack on November 8, energy company Centrenergo said two power plants in the Kyiv and Kharkiv regions had been devastated. Ukrainian authorities also said Russia had targeted substations powering nuclear power plants during the attack, forcing two plants to reduce output.
“Russia is deliberately endangering nuclear safety in Europe,” Andriy Sybiha, Ukraine’s top diplomat, said in a statement.
Private energy supplier DTEK has also said that its thermal power plants were targeted on four separate occasions in October and November.
The repeated attacks have forced Ukrainian authorities to introduce rolling blackouts in most regions, with some cities experiencing power outages of 14-16 hours. In the Ukrainian capital, diesel generators were operating in several districts as the air raid alert was lifted.