Ukraine calls drone attack by Russia its most intense yet
KYIV, Ukraine — Russia on Saturday morning launched its most intense drone attack on Ukraine since the beginning of its full-scale invasion in 2022, targeting the Ukrainian capital, military officials said.
Russia launched 75 Iranianmade Shahed drones against Ukraine, of which 74 were destroyed by air defenses, Ukraine’s air force said.
“Kyiv was the main target,” Ukrainian Air Force Commander Mykola Oleshchuk wrote on his Telegram channel.
At least five civilians were wounded in the hourslong assault, which saw several buildings damaged by falling debris from downed drones, including a kindergarten. The wounded included an 11-year-old child, according to Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko.
In the city’s Solomiansky district, debris left a crater in the courtyard of a residential area, and the windows of a nearby building were blown out. Residents, most of them elderly, received medical attention at the scene. Others took shelter in a nearby subway station. As people were clearing up debris and broken glass in the neighborhood, the hum of a fresh wave of drones could be heard nearby.
The assault on Kyiv began at 4 a.m. local time, continued in waves for more than six hours and caused power outages in 77 residential buildings and 120 institutions, according to Serhii Popko, head of the Kyiv city administration. Ukraine’s Energy Ministry said 17,000 people were without power in the Kyiv region as a result of the attack, noting that four power lines were damaged. Power was restored in the early afternoon.
The attack was carried out on the morning of Holodomor Memorial Day, which commemorates the manmade famine in Soviet Ukraine that killed millions of Ukrainians from 1932 to 1933. It is marked on the fourth Saturday in November.
Speaking on Saturday at the Grain from Ukraine summit, which saw leaders and parliamentary representatives from Belgium, Ireland, Finland, the Czech Republic, Poland and Estonia meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv to discuss global food security, Zelenskyy warned that if Russian President Vladimir Putin “could arrange another Holodomor for Ukraine, he would do it.”
Besides Kyiv, the Sumy, Dnipropetrovsk, Zaporizhzhia, Mykolaiv and Kirovohrad regions were also targeted.
Meanwhile, shelling killed one person and wounded three in the southern Kherson region, regional Gov. Oleksandr Prokudin said Saturday. According to Prokudin, the region had been shelled 100 times over the previous 24 hours.