Russia targets Kyiv with cruise missile strike
Ukraine claims it shot down all 31 projectiles launched in retaliation for cross-border attacks
‘The existing air-defence systems are not enough to protect our entire territory from Russia’ ‘Iran may transfer ballistic missiles and related technology to Russia for use against Ukraine’
VOLODYMYR ZELENSKY urged European leaders to hand over dozens more air-defence systems yesterday after at least 17 people were injured in a Russian missile barrage against Kyiv.
Ukraine’s air force said it had shot down all 31 hypersonic, ballistic and cruise missiles that were launched at the capital for the first time in more than a month.
Homes, medical facilities and businesses were damaged as the burning debris of the intercepted projectiles rained down on the city.
Moscow had vowed to take revenge for a recent spate of cross-border attacks. Vitali Klitschko, Kyiv’s mayor, said some missile fragments had landed on a nursery in the capital, which was empty at the time.
In the Lukyanivka neighbourhood the strikes left a deep crater in the street. Windows were smashed and cars left damaged as the shockwaves from the nearby blast reverberated outwards.
Images later showed members of a bomb disposal unit grappling with part of a Russian missile that had crashed to the ground.
The bombardment, which came from all directions, lasted for three hours, said Serhiy Popko, the head of the city’s military administration.
“All the air defence provided to Ukraine, in particular by European countries, keeps our cities and villages safe,” Mr Zelensky told a European Union leaders’ summit in Brussels via a video link.
“But the existing air-defence systems are not enough to protect our entire territory from Russia. And it’s not a matter of hundreds of systems, but of an achievable number – to protect all the territory of Ukraine.”
“You all know what steps need to be taken,” he added.
Kyiv’s European allies have supplied Us-made Patriots, German Iris-t and the Franco-italian Samp/t air-defence systems.
But Ukrainian officials have warned its forces will soon have to start rationing interceptor ammunition and take decisions over what Russian missiles to shoot down because of shortages.
Yesterday, the governor of Russia’s Belgorod region said three people had been killed in “massive strikes” involving air attacks and ground assaults by armed groups from Ukraine.
Three anti-kremlin militias fighting for Kyiv told reporters the week-long cross-border raids were continuing.
Denis Nikitin, the commander of the Russian Volunteer Corps, one of the groups involved, said his forces had captured 37 Russian soldiers who wanted to switch allegiances to oppose Vladimir Putin during the operation.
Meanwhile, in Brussels, EU leaders were discussing plans to raise €3 billion (£2.6billion) a year to buy Kyiv weapons by using the earnings from frozen Russian assets.
Olaf Scholz, the German chancellor, backed the scheme, but senior EU diplomats warned that opposition from a number of member states, including Hungary, Cyprus and Malta, meant a deal would not be struck immediately.
EU leaders called for new sanctions against Iran, Belarus and North Korea for supplying Moscow with weapons used to target civilians on the first day of their summit in Brussels.
A draft statement seen by The Telegraph warned that Tehran “may transfer ballistic missiles and related technology to Russia for use against Ukraine after having supplied the Russian regime with unmanned aerial vehicles, which are used in relentless attacks against the civilian population in Ukraine”. The move came as Russia’s defence ministry boasted that it had begun the mass production of three-ton high-explosive aerial bombs.
Moscow’s air force has been using the powerful munitions, which are converted Soviet-era bombs, to devastating effect because they can be dropped outside of the range of Ukraine’s air-defence systems.
In a battle of their own, EU leaders clashed over their radical plans to boost defence spending by common debt at a time when many member states are increasingly worried by the prospect of a wider conflict with Russia.
Diplomats said Emmanuel Macron, the French president, wanted to use so-called European Defence Bonds to pay for the largest rearmament of Europe since the end of the Cold War.
However, Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands came out in opposition to using debts to cover for EU states not hitting defence spending targets set by Nato.