Six dead and dozens wounded in Russian attack on Ukraine | Ukraine

Six people died and dozens were injured With Russia’s drone and missile attack on Ukraine.

Nearly 600 drones and 36 rockets were fired at the country in the attack, which President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said underlined Ukraine’s need for Western assistance in air defense as well as other financial and political support.

“We must work without losing a day to ensure that we have enough missiles for our air defense systems, that we have everything we need to protect ourselves and put pressure on Russia,” Zelenskyy said.

Ukrainian state emergency services said two people were killed and 38 people were injured in the night attack in Kiev. The attack knocked out power to the western half of the city, leaving at least 500,000 people without electricity. Emergency crews restored power to more than 400,000 households.

One person was killed in the region surrounding the capital, two people were killed in the southeastern Dnipropetrovsk region and one person was killed in the midday attack in the southern Kherson region, regional officials and police said.

“While everyone is discussing the points of peace plans, Russia continues to pursue its two-point ‘war plan’: To kill and destroy,” Ukrainian foreign minister Andrii Sybiha wrote Saturday morning, as Kiev residents surveyed the damage after a night of intense explosions that mostly targeted the capital.

Two waves of attacks could be heard in the capital; The first started around 1am, the second started around 7am and the all clear was given just before 9.30am.

The Ukrainian military said the Afipsky oil refinery in Krasnodar Krai, one of the largest refineries in southern Russia, was attacked and caused a fire at the facility. The facility supplies diesel and jet fuel to Russian forces fighting in Ukraine.

As the war approaches its fourth year, Russia is waging a campaign to break Ukraine’s civil resistance by attacking its energy infrastructure this winter. The attacks came after a number of prominent Ukrainian political figures were embroiled in a corruption scandal.

On Friday, Zelenskyy’s private secretary Andriy Yermak was forced to resign after his office was searched by anti-corruption authorities investigating a kickback scheme. Two other ministers have already been fired, and a former friend of Zelenskyy’s who was allegedly the architect of the plan has also fled the country.

Zelenskyy said on Friday that he would restructure the presidency, which Yermak has held as the leader’s caretaker, amid speculation about who could rule or how it might be reshuffled.

An opposition lawmaker called on the president to appoint Valerii Zaluzhnyi, Ukraine’s ambassador to the UK and former head of the armed forces. “A man trusted by the military, citizens and international partners is exactly what we need right now,” Ukrainian politician Liudmyla Buimister wrote in a social media post.

Zaluzhnyi is seen as a potential political rival to Zelenskyy, but the ambassador’s allies said they were not sure he would accept when asked on Saturday.

“I am going to the front and I am prepared for any retaliation,” Yermak told the New York Post overnight. However, it was not clear how he would serve in the military. “I am an honest and decent person,” he added in his text message.

Yermak has led Ukraine’s negotiating team for the past two weeks as Kiev responds to the pro-Russian 28-point plan announced by the White House. He demanded that Ukraine withdraw from Donetsk province, agree on a general amnesty, and lift western sanctions against Russia.

Talks stalled this week during the US Thanksgiving holiday but are expected to resume soon. Zelenskyy said that the Ukrainian delegation, led by Rustem Umerov, secretary of the country’s national security council, was on its way to Washington.

On Saturday, a US official told Reuters that Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner will meet with Ukrainian officials in Florida on Sunday.

Ukraine submitted a 19-article counter proposal shared with Moscow. Witkoff is expected to arrive in the Russian capital next week, but few expect a breakthrough since Russian President Vladimir Putin last week called Ukraine’s leadership illegitimate.

Kiev’s position is weakened by the corruption scandal, easily the most serious domestic political crisis of Zelenskyy’s presidency; Russia, on the other hand, hopes that its continued bombings and a possible financial crisis for Ukraine will wear it down.

Ukraine hopes EU leaders will agree a €140bn (£122bn) loan secured against Russian central bank assets to support its budget from next year, but opposition from Belgium, where most of the money is held, has dampened hopes of reaching a deal by the end of the year.