A large-scale Russian attack on Ukraine killed at least 11 civilians and emergency workers and wounded 53 across Ukraine, according to President Volodomyr Zelensky.
The attacks on the capital of Kyiv, and the second-largest city of Kharkiv, came after Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke separately by phone with US President Donald Trump on Sunday. The exchange suggests Washington hasn’t given up on its diplomatic efforts to stop the fighting that followed Moscow’s all-out invasion of its neighbour in February 2022.
Five were killed in Kyiv, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said, where at least 30 others were also wounded, including two children aged 5 and 6, according to Tymur Tkachenko, head of the city's military administration.
A series of powerful explosions were heard across Kyiv, with a wave of ballistic missiles followed by Shahed drones as many people sought shelter underground. Clouds of black smoke drifted over the city.
Five strikes hit civilian sites in the city’s Shevchenkivskyi district in under 30 minutes, Tkachenko said, including a 25-story apartment building, while a market and a grocery store caught fire. In the Obolonskyi district, a nine-story residential building took a direct hit.
Russia’s defence ministry said the strikes targeted defence and industrial facilities in Kyiv, Kharkiv, and Dnipro, including enterprises and workshops producing components for long-range drones and cruise missiles. It said that a workshop producing medium- and long-range drones located on the premises of the Dovzhenko film studios in Kyiv was among the targets hit.
Russia also claimed to have hit Kyiv’s Radar plant, which it said makes drone components, and the Mayak plant that it said makes Ukraine's Flamingo long-range cruise missiles. Military conscription offices in Kyiv were also struck, it said.
There was no immediate information about the 11th person killed in the attacks.
Religious landmark hit
In Kyiv, smoke billowed around the golden domes of the Dormition Cathedral in the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, a revered religious landmark.
Its roof caught fire during the attack, said Metropolitan Epiphanius, head of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine. He condemned the strike as another Russian crime “against humanity, against history, against Christianity,” and appealed for prayers to save the site.
The Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, also known as the Monastery of the Caves, is a sprawling complex of monasteries and churches, including some underground, built between the 11th and 19th centuries. Some of the churches at the UNESCO-listed World Heritage site are connected by a labyrinthine complex of caves spanning more than 600 metres (2,000 feet).
Zelensky said the damage was caused by two Russian drones and called the attack Moscow’s “biggest crime yet against Christian culture.” He visited the scene with Prime Minister Yuliia Svyrydenko and other government officials.
The cathedral, churches and other buildings overlook the Dnieper River and have been a pilgrimage site for centuries.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said the attack was the “equivalent, for us French, of a bombing of Notre-Dame” in Paris.
Ukraine’s National Commission for UNESCO, which coordinates the country's cooperation with the UN educational, scientific and cultural body, urged the international community to step up pressure on Moscow to stop its invasion and to throw it out of the organisation.
“By destroying Ukraine’s cultural heritage, (Russia) seeks to erase historical memory and inflicts damage upon the heritage of all humankind,” the commission said in a statement.
Russia’s defence ministry claimed, without offering evidence, that the complex was hit by one of Ukraine’s US-made Patriot air defence missiles, saying that it might have veered off course due to its age.
Ukraine’s air force said Russia launched 70 missiles and 611 drones overnight, primarily targeting Kyiv, while also striking the cities of Dnipro and Kharkiv.
The military said air defenses intercepted or electronically suppressed 632 aerial targets, including 50 missiles and 582 drones.
Preliminary data showed 20 ballistic missiles and 27 attack drones hit 42 locations across the country, while debris from intercepted drones fell at 12 sites.
Russia’s defence ministry said air defenses downed 123 Ukrainian drones overnight.
(FRANCE 24 with AP)
