Ukraine's president said missiles and drones hit energy sites and homes, with the worst toll in Pryluky. The interior minister later put the national death toll at 28. Moscow said it struck military-industrial targets.
Russia hit Ukraine with missiles and drones overnight, in what President Volodymyr Zelenskiy called one of Moscow's most vile strikes, Reuters reported from Kyiv. He said at least 25 people were killed, including children, and 100 were injured, and that industrial and energy sites were damaged. Interior Minister Ivan Vyhivskyi later put the death toll at 28. The counts differ and were still being updated.
The heaviest loss was in Pryluky, in Chernihiv region, where a missile destroyed a five-storey residential building. Zelenskiy said 19 people died there, including five children. A later Reuters item quoted regional governor Vyacheslav Chaus putting the Pryluky toll at 13, including four children, with 50 injured. Those local and national figures do not match and are reported as given.
Zelenskiy said the attacks coincided with President Vladimir Putin's birthday and called the killing of children the present Putin gave himself. Russia's defence ministry said its forces carried out a massive strike on military-industrial facilities using precision weapons and drones. The BBC said Moscow had not commented further on the latest strikes in its account.
Zelenskiy said Ukrainian forces hit four targets in Russia over 24 hours, including two oil facilities and a training ground in the Perm, Samara and Astrakhan regions. He said energy infrastructure was a key target of the Russian attack.
Rescue work was continuing. No independent single toll was established in the reports used here.
People Sentiments Negative
- Volodymyr Zelenskiy called the strikes one of Russia's most vile.
- He said the attacks were a birthday present Putin gave himself in the killing of children.