A Russian drone explodes in Kyiv. (Reuters: Gleb Garanich)
In short:
Russia launched a heavy drone and missile attack on Ukraine overnight on Friday local time, killing eight people and wounding dozens, Ukrainian officials said.
Kyiv residents told of harrowing escapes and near misses in the dead of night.
In response, Volodomyr Zelenskyy said Ukraine launched its own drone and missile attack on Russian targets.
Russia launched a heavy drone and missile attack on Ukraine, killing six people in Kyiv and two more in the south in strikes on energy facilities, apartment buildings and infrastructure, Ukrainian officials said.
Ukraine responded by launching its own domestically developed drones and missiles against targets on Russian soil, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said.
He said the Russian forces used 430 drones and 18 missiles early on Friday, local time, making the attack the biggest on Kyiv in almost three weeks.
The Ukrainian air force said most of the drones and missiles were shot down, but officials said falling debris and fires damaged high-rise apartments, a school, a medical facility and administrative buildings across nine districts in the city of about 3 million.
"A wicked attack — as of now, we know of dozens of wounded, including children and a pregnant woman," Mr Zelenskyy said in a post on X.
City officials said that six people were killed in Kyiv, which was the focus of the attacks. Russian drones also struck the Black Sea city of Chornomorsk, killing two people, the regional governor said.
Moscow denies targeting civilian areas, with the Russian Defense Ministry saying it carried out an overnight strike on Ukraine's "military-industrial and energy facilities."
Ukrainian officials refuted those claims, showing repeated damage to homes and public buildings.
Smoke rises from a damaged apartment building in Kyiv. (Reuters: Valentyn Ogirenko)
'So many people were screaming'
Kyiv residents told of harrowing escapes and near misses in the dead of night.
Anastasia, 29, said the moment her apartment block was hit "you don't know what to do".
"So many people were screaming and needed help,"she said.
Mr Zelenskyy said the Azerbaijani Embassy was hit by debris from an Iskander missile.
Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said that at least 29 people were injured across the city, including two children, and a pregnant woman was among nine people treated in hospital.
Pictures showed flames rising over the city at various sites, as residents huddled in rubble-strewn streets outside apartment buildings after the attack.
The city's heating system also suffered damage, with service interrupted in one district, but emergency outages had been resolved, the mayor said.
Employees work at a thermal power plant damaged by a recent Russian missile strike. (Reuters: Gleb Garanich)
Partial power cuts were announced in the central Kyiv region, in the southern Odesa region, and in the Donetsk region in the east, the energy ministry said.
The governor of the Kyiv region outside the capital said drone and missile attacks injured six people, including a seven-year-old child, and triggered several fires.
Russia accuses Ukraine of hitting civilian sites
Ukraine responded to the Russian attacks with long-range strikes on what it said targeted military targets and depots that provide Moscow with income that supply the armed forces.
However, the Russian Defense Ministry accused Ukraine of hitting civilian facilities and claimed the overnight strike on Kyiv came in response to that.
Over 60 Ukrainian drones were intercepted over the southern Krasnodar region that borders Crimea, according to the Defense Ministry.
A total of 45 drones were destroyed over the Saratov region deeper inside Russia, while another 19 were shot down over Crimea.
In Novorossiysk, a port city in the Krasnodar region, the attack damaged an oil depot at the Sheskharis transhipment complex, as well as unidentified "coastal structures," local authorities said.
Falling drone debris also damaged a civilian vessel in the port, and three crew members were hospitalised with injuries.
Several residential buildings were also damaged, and a man from one of those buildings was hospitalised with injuries, officials said.
In the Saratov region, Governor Roman Busargin said that the attack damage unspecified "civilian infrastructure".
Reuters/AP
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