Russian missile attacks on Ukrainian energy facilities kill at least four | Ukraine

According to Ukrainian officials, Russia attacked Ukraine with drones and missiles overnight, killing at least four people and damaging energy infrastructure in three separate regions.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that Russia launched more than 450 unmanned aerial vehicles and 45 missiles, and most of them were shot down.

3 people died and 12 people were injured when a drone crashed into an apartment building in Dnipro, and one more person died in the Kharkiv region. According to Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Svyrydenko, energy infrastructure in Kiev, Poltava and Kharkiv regions was damaged due to strikes.

While power companies worked to restore electricity, water and heat, some cities resorted to generators to keep the power on. Kremenchuk and Horishni Plavni in the central Poltava region use generators to ensure water supply, municipal officials said.

Zelenskyy called for more sanctions following the attacks. “Every Moscow attack on energy infrastructure aimed at harming ordinary people before winter should be met with a sanctions response targeting all Russian energy without exception,” he said.

According to state energy company Naftogaz, Russian attacks on Ukraine’s energy sector have increased in recent months; The army has attacked gas facilities nine times in the last two months.

On Saturday, Ukrainian drones hit an electrical transformer in northern Russia, and two people were separately injured in an attack on a residential building in the city of Saratov.

Russia claimed that the “major attack” was against Ukraine’s weapons production and energy facilities. It also said it had captured a village in eastern Ukraine as forces there continued to gradually advance towards the front line.

Despite US pressure for a ceasefire, negotiations for a permanent ceasefire in Ukraine failed. In October, Donald Trump called on Russia and Ukraine to freeze existing front lines and end the war.

Opening talks by freezing the front lines was supported by Zelenskyy but rejected by Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov, who said Moscow was only interested in “long-term, sustainable peace”.

Former NATO secretary-general Anders Fogh Rasmussen warned on Thursday that Ukraine would face “an endless war” and the gradual erosion of its territory if Europe did not increase pressure on Russia.

The conflict began in February 2022 when Russia invaded Ukraine; This was the beginning of the largest and deadliest war in Europe since the second world war.