Ukraine’s Emergency Service stated 64 individuals have been wounded throughout the nation within the Monday morning (Monday night AEDT) assaults — the largest and broadest because the early days of the warfare. At the very least 12 have been killed in Kyiv and Dnipro.
Although some missiles apparently focused vitality amenities, others struck civilian areas through the morning rush hour. One hit a playground in downtown Kyiv and one other struck a central constructing of a neighborhood college.
Andriy Yermak, a senior adviser to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, stated there was no “sensible army sense” within the strikes and Russia’s aim was to trigger a “humanitarian disaster.”
Putin stated the Russian army launched precision weapons from the air, sea and floor to focus on key vitality and army command amenities.
He warned that if Ukraine continues to mount “terrorist assaults” on Russia, Moscow’s response will likely be “robust and proportionate to the extent of threats”.
Amid the onslaught, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy stated on his Telegram account that Russia is “attempting to destroy us and wipe us off the face of the earth”.
“Please don’t go away (bomb) shelters,” he wrote.
“Let’s maintain on and be robust.”
Belarus and Russia to deploy joint forces
Moscow’s warfare in Ukraine is approaching its eight-month milestone and the Kremlin is reeling from humiliating battlefield setbacks in areas it’s attempting to annex.
Russia’s intense, hours-long assault on Ukraine marked a sudden army escalation by Moscow.
The sustained barrage on main cities hit residential areas and significant infrastructure amenities alike, portending a significant surge within the warfare amid a profitable Ukrainian counteroffensive in latest weeks.
The Ukrainian Normal Employees stated 84 cruise missiles and 24 drones have been use within the barrage. Ukrainian forces shot down 56 aerial targets, it stated.
Civilian areas and vitality infrastructure focused
The targets have been civilian areas and vitality amenities in 10 cities, Zelenskyy stated in a video handle.
“(The Russians) selected such a time and such targets on objective to inflict essentially the most injury,” Zelenskyy stated.
The morning strikes despatched Kyiv residents again into bomb shelters for the primary time in months. Town’s subway system stopped prepare providers and made the stations out there as soon as extra as bomb shelters.
Whereas air raid sirens have continued all through the warfare in Ukraine’s main cities throughout the nation, in Kyiv and different areas the place there have been months of calm many Ukrainians had begun to disregard their warnings and go about their regular enterprise.
That modified on Monday morning. The assaults arrived in Kyiv in the beginning of the morning rush hour, when commuter site visitors was starting to select up.
At the very least one of many automobiles struck close to the Kyiv Nationwide College gave the impression to be a commuter minibus, referred to as a “marshrutka,” and a preferred albeit typically crowded different to the town’s bus and metro routes.
Close by, a minimum of one strike landed within the standard Shevchenko Park, leaving a big gap close to a youngsters’s playground.
Among the many targets hit was the Klitschko pedestrian bridge — a landmark in central Kyiv with its glass panels. Closed-circuit tv footage confirmed an enormous explosion because the bridge was struck, and a person working away after the blast.
Assaults spark worldwide condemnation
The assaults introduced a refrain of shock within the West.
US President Joe Biden condemned the strikes, saying they “killed and injured civilians and destroyed targets with no army objective”, demonstrating the “utter brutality of Mr Putin’s unlawful warfare on the Ukrainian individuals”.
“Alongside our allies and companions, we are going to proceed to impose prices on Russia for its aggression, maintain Putin and Russia accountable for its atrocities and warfare crimes, and supply the help mandatory for Ukrainian forces to defend their nation and their freedom,” he stated.
French President Emmanuel Macron expressed “excessive concern”. British International Secretary James Cleverly tweeted that “Russia’s firing of missiles into civilian areas of Ukraine is unacceptable”.
European Fee President Ursula von der Leyen stated she was “shocked and appalled” by the assaults and pledged to face by Ukraine for “so long as it takes”.
“Russia as soon as once more has proven to the world what it stands for — it’s terror and brutality,” she stated.
“Those that are accountable should be held accountable.”
Ukrainian International minister Dmytro Kuleba broke off his Africa tour and headed again to Ukraine, saying on Twitter the assaults represented “terror on peaceable Ukrainian cities”.
Three of the missiles have been fired from ships within the Black Sea and crossed into Moldovan airspace earlier than touchdown in Ukraine, in line with Moldova’s Deputy Prime Minister and International Affairs Minister Nicu Popescu.
Popescu stated he had summoned the Russian ambassador for an evidence.
Moldova lies on Ukraine’s south-western border, near the essential Black Sea port metropolis of Odesa.
Putin accuses Ukraine of ‘terrorist assault’ on Crimean bridge
The assaults got here simply hours after Russian President Vladimir Putin known as a Saturday explosion on the massive bridge connecting Russia to its annexed territory of Crimea a “terrorist act” masterminded by Ukrainian particular providers.
The primary strikes on Kyiv in 4 months focused the centre of the town and left lifeless and wounded, an Emergency Service spokesperson instructed the AP early on Monday (Monday evening AEDT).
Blasts have been reported within the metropolis’s Shevchenko district, a big space within the centre of Kyiv that features the historic previous city in addition to a number of authorities places of work, mayor Vitali Klitschko stated.
A few of the strikes hit close to the federal government quarter within the symbolic coronary heart of the capital, the place Parliament and different main landmarks are situated. A glass tower housing places of work was considerably broken, most of its blue-tinted home windows blown out.
Lesia Vasylenko, a member of Ukraine’s parliament, posted a photograph on Twitter displaying that a minimum of one explosion occurred close to the principle constructing of the Kyiv Nationwide College in central Kyiv.
After the primary early morning strikes in Kyiv, extra loud explosions have been heard later within the morning in an intensification of Russia’s assault that might spell a significant escalation within the warfare.
The final earlier assault on Kyiv was in June. One of many missiles struck an condo constructing, killing one and wounding six. However not like earlier assaults that principally hit Kyiv’s outskirts, Monday’s strike focused a number of places within the very centre of the town.
Air raid sirens sound for hours throughout the nation
Elsewhere, Russia focused civilian areas and vitality infrastructure as air raid sirens sounded in each area of Ukraine, besides Russia-annexed Crimea, for 4 straight hours.
Related Press journalists within the centre of Dnipro metropolis noticed the our bodies of a number of individuals killed at an industrial website on the town’s outskirts. Home windows within the space had been blown out and glass littered the road.
Ukrainian media reported explosions in various different places, together with the western metropolis of Lviv that has been a refuge for many individuals fleeing the combating within the east, in addition to Ternopil, Khmelnytskyi, Zhytomyr and Kropyvnytskyi.
Kharkiv was hit 3 times, mayor Ihor Terekhov stated. The strikes knocked out the electrical energy and water provide. Power infrastructure was additionally hit in Lviv, Regional Governor Maksym Kozytskyi stated.
Latest combating has centered on the areas simply north of Crimea, together with Zaporizhzhia, the place six missiles have been launched in a single day Saturday from Russian-occupied areas of the Zaporizhzhia area.
The Kerch Bridge is vital to Russia strategically, as a army provide line to its forces in Ukraine, and symbolically, as an emblem of its claims on Crimea. Nobody has claimed accountability for damaging the 19-kilometre-long bridge, the longest in Europe.
Following the strikes on Kyiv, a number of residents have been seen on the streets with blood on their garments and palms. A younger man sporting a blue jacket sat on the bottom as a medic wrapped a bandage round his head.
The ‘priceless’ Ukrainian treasures which have vanished within the warfare
A lady with bandages wrapped round her head had blood everywhere in the entrance of her shirt. A number of vehicles have been additionally broken or utterly destroyed.
Some feared Monday’s assaults could be the primary salvo in a renewed Russian offensive. Ukraine’s Ministry of Training introduced that each one colleges in Ukraine should swap to on-line lessons a minimum of till the tip of this week.
