KYIV, Ukraine — Russia launched dozens of missiles and around 500 attack drones across Ukraine early Sunday, damaging energy infrastructure across the country and killing at least five people, officials said.
The combined assault struck nine regions and left tens of thousands of people without electricity as Russia ramps up its energy war on Ukraine ahead of the coldest and darkest days of the year. Houses, apartment buildings, and an oncology center were also damaged. Among the victims was a family of four, including a 15-year-old girl, in the western Lviv region, officials said.
In a Telegram post Sunday, Russia’s Defense Ministry said it used a variety of missiles and drones to target “enterprises of the Ukrainian military-industrial complex and gas-energy infrastructure facilities that supported their operation.” It did not acknowledge civilian deaths or that the attacks struck civilian infrastructure, but said: “The strike objectives have been achieved. All designated targets were hit.”
Russia has in recent days repeatedly assaulted power and gas infrastructure across the country, stirring fears that Ukraine’s heating system will be weakened ahead of winter, which could trigger a new exodus of refugees into the European Union.
Ukraine has also inflicted serious damage on Russia’s energy infrastructure with its long-range drones, targeting oil refineries and pipelines that help fund Russia’s war machine. Those attacks have caused enough damage to force Russia to partially halt diesel exports by traders and increasingly rely on imported gasoline.
Russia’s massive overnight assault spared Kyiv, the best-protected city in Ukraine, and focused instead on infrastructure elsewhere, seeking loopholes in Ukraine’s patchwork of air defense systems that has made it impossible to protect the country from Russian bombing campaigns.
“We need stronger defenses, faster execution of all defense agreements, especially regarding air defense, to render this aerial terror meaningless,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky wrote on Telegram. “A unilateral cease-fire in the skies is possible, and it may open the way to genuine diplomacy. America and Europe must act to force Putin to stop.”
Ukrainian Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko said the intention behind the strike was “to sow panic ahead of winter, especially in regions far from the front line.”
Following the early morning strikes, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha reiterated Ukraine’s calls for more economic pressure on Moscow, writing on X: “Buying Russian energy is equal to funding war crimes against Ukraine.”
The attack followed another violent day in Ukraine Saturday, when Russia repeatedly attacked the northern city of Shostka, in Sumy region, twice hitting the railway station where a passenger train was full of civilians.
At least one elderly man was killed on board the train and 30 other people, including three children, were wounded. The train was partially destroyed. The city’s energy infrastructure was also damaged, causing power outages and prompting the mayor to ask residents to limit use of gas appliances.
Sybiha said the attack on passenger trains was “targeted and deliberate.”
“This is one of the cruelest Russian tactics — the so-called ‘double strike,’ when a second attack hits rescuers and people evacuating,” he wrote on Telegram. “We need new, devastating sanctions. We need renewed strengthening of support for Ukraine. It can and must be done to raise the cost of this war for Russia.”
“Putin must feel a personal danger from continuing this war — for himself and for his regime,” he wrote.
Ukraine is pleading for the United States and Europe to both send Ukraine new air defenses and impose new sanctions on Russia to further limit its war economy which makes weapons production possible.
US-made Patriot systems are the only air defense systems that can reliably intercept Russian ballistic missiles that regularly bombard the civilian population, smashing into apartment buildings, businesses, and other civilian infrastructure. Even those systems have failed to intercept some recent attacks, including on Kyiv, in part because Russia continues to manipulate its missiles to evade the systems, experts say.
Ukraine recently announced that Israel had provided one Patriot system to Ukraine, marking the first time Israel has provided such assistance to Ukraine after years of requests. Several other systems are expected from European partners this fall. But it would probably take dozens to provide any semblance of an air shield over the country.
Instead, mobile air defense groups perched on pickup trucks and rooftops use machine guns to target the swarms of Russian drones that fly through the country most days. Russia has also manipulated those weapons, now often launching them on ballistic trajectories that make them harder to intercept until they are homing in on their targets, often in heavily populated areas.
