6 hours ago
8
Russia has launched a large-scale drone and missile attack at Kyiv, injuring 15 people in one of the biggest assaults on the Ukrainian capital since the beginning of the war three years ago.
The attack came in waves, with Russia launching 14 ballistic missiles and 250 drones in the early hours of Saturday morning, although Ukrainian forces shot down six missiles and stopped most of the drones before they reached Kyiv.
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said it was a “difficult night for all of Ukraine” and called for more sanctions on Russia in order to achieve a ceasefire.
The attack came hours after Russia and Ukraine began a prisoner exchange of hundreds soldiers and civilians, the first phase of a deal agreed in Istanbul earlier in the week. The agreement was viewed as a first step towards a permanent ceasefire between the two countries.
Saturday’s overnight attack prompted people to flee into Kyiv’s subway station as they sought shelter from the aerial assault. Missile debris and unintercepted bombs caused damage in six districts of Kyiv, with plumes of smoke rising from where they landed.
The Obolon district in particular was hard hit, with at least five wounded and a residential building heavily damaged in the attack, Ukrainian officials said.
The air raid alert in Kyiv lasted more than seven hours as successive waves of drones and missiles were launched towards the Ukrainian capital. The strikes came after several days of Ukrainian drone attacks on Russia, including Moscow – attacks that prompted the Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, to vow retaliation.
“I wish they’d agree to a ceasefire,” said Olha Chyrukha, a 64-year-old resident of Kyiv, standing outside an apartment building damaged in the bombings. “To bomb people like this …”
Other people said that their homes were no longer habitable as a result of the attacks.
The prisoner swap, in which 1,000 prisoners will be released from each side, was meant to bring Russia and Ukraine closer to achieving a lasting ceasefire deal. Friday’s swap brought 390 Ukrainians back home, with further releases expected over the weekend. It was the largest prisoner exchange since the beginning of the war.
Despite the mutual gesture of goodwill, fighting continued unabated between Russia and Ukraine. Prospects for progress towards a ceasefire also seemed dim, with the Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, saying on Friday that the place for the next round of diplomatic talks had yet to be chosen.
after newsletter promotion
Lavrov said that Moscow would hand Ukraine a draft text stating its conditions for a truce once the prisoner swap had been completed.
International pressure to end the Ukraine-Russia war, now in its third year, has been growing in recent months. Donald Trump has made ending fighting a key foreign policy aim of his administration. The US president asked Ukraine and Russia to attend renewed talks to achieve a peace deal, a request to which both countries have nominally agreed.
European leaders have accused Moscow of stalling in peace talks while Russian troops try to capture more Ukrainian territory.
After the attack on Kyiv, Zelenskyy accused Russia of seeking to sabotage peace talks, a claim Moscow has also levied at Ukraine.
“With each such attack, the world becomes more certain that the cause of prolonging the war lies in Moscow,” Zelenskyy said in a post on X. “Ukraine has proposed a ceasefire many times … It all has been ignored.”
