According to Ukrainian officials, the Russian suicide drone raid caused extensive damage, resulting in emergency blackouts across ten provinces and the nation’s capital of Kyiv.
According to Oleksiy Kuleba, governor of Kyiv province, home to more than three million people, a Russian suicide drone assault early Monday morning injured two persons and many buildings and homes damaged.
This time, he admitted that “the attack had done serious damage” and that electricity had been cut off in three regions of Kyiv province.
“Enemy UAVs have been shooting at energy plants all over the country. In the capital Kyiv and the province with the same name, Sumy, Kharkiv, Poltava, Dnipro, Zaporizhzhia, Kirovograd, Zhytomyr, Chernihiv, and Cherkasy, there are alternating emergency power cuts “, Ukrainian energy operator Ukrenergo announced.
Firefighters deploy at an energy facility in Kyiv, Ukraine, on December 19. Photo: Reuters.
Before this revelation, the Ukrainian Air Force had claimed to have shot down 30 of the 35 suicide drones used by Russia in the strike.
There have been three airstrikes on the Ukrainian capital in the previous week. There has been no response from the Russian Defense Ministry.
More than 70 cruise missiles of various types were used in a Russian military strike on several Ukrainian cities, including the capital, Kyiv, last weekend.
Since October, Russia has been launching attacks against Ukraine’s energy and military infrastructure to reduce Kyiv’s fighting capacity and bring it to the negotiating table.
Nearly half of Ukraine’s energy infrastructure has been destroyed or damaged after months of Russian raids, leaving people without electricity and heating for hours in sub-zero weather.
Ukraine says attacks on infrastructure are “war crimes,” accusing Russia of intentionally harming civilians and breaking its will. Meanwhile, Moscow explained that it targeted Ukrainian infrastructure to disrupt the flow of American and allied weapons to Kyiv.