Russia launches ‘massive missile attack’ on Ukraine

Russia has launched a “massive missile attack” on Ukraine, officials said, knocking out power and forcing people to take cover in shelters across the country amid reports of fatalities.

Authorities on social media reported explosions in the capital Kyiv, southern Kryvyi Rih and northeastern Kharkiv on Friday as air raid sirens were sounded across the country warning of a fresh devastating barrage of Russian strikes on critical energy facilities and infrastructure.

The Black Sea region of Odesa was also targeted, including the central cities of Vinnytsia, Poltava, and the northern Sumy region.

Two people had been killed and at least five injured – including two children – in the attack on Kryvyi Rih, the governor of Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk region said.

Ukraine war latest: Air raid alarms across Ukraine as key cities hit

There was no immediate word of more casualties, as air defence systems went into operation across Ukraine.

Ukraine’s railway operator said a number of lines has been impacted and left without power.

It was also unclear what other infrastructure had been hit.

“They want to destroy us, and make us slaves. But we will not surrender. We will endure,” said Lidiya Vasilieva, 53, as she headed for shelter at a Kyiv railway station.

“I want the war over and soon. But I’m ready to wait as long as needed.”

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Around 60 Russian missiles had been spotted heading for targets across the country, according to Vitaly Kim, governor of the Mykolaiv region in southern Ukraine.

People were thought to be trapped under the rubble of a residential building which was hit in Kryvyi Rih, local officials said.

“The enemy is massively attacking,” Oleksii Kuleba, head of Kyiv’s regional military administration, said in a post on Telegram.

“Do not ignore air raid alerts, remain in shelters,” Kyrylo Tymoshenko, deputy head of the president’s office, wrote on the messaging app.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko reported explosions in the northeastern Desnianskyi and western Holosiivskyi districts, urging residents to go to shelters.

“The attack on the capital continues,” he wrote.

Kharkiv, home to more than a million people, was left entirely without electricity, as was the smaller city of Poltava in central Ukraine, the Oblenergo energy provider reported. There were power outages in Sumy too.

Following several key battlefield losses by Russian forces in recent months, strikes targeting energy infrastructure have been part of Moscow’s new strategy to try to freeze Ukrainians into submission.

Friday’s attacks are the latest of several big waves of missile strikes since October.

At least eight people were killed and 23 wounded by Ukrainian shelling in the Russian-controlled Luhansk region of Ukraine, Russia’s state news agency TASS reported on Friday, citing an unidentified source in the emergency services.