Russian ballistic missiles kill 16 in Ukraine’s Kyiv

Russian ballistic missiles killed 16 people and injured more than 40 in Kyiv early yesterday, authorities said, damaging buildings and severing power supply to some parts of the Ukrainian capital.

A fire broke out and the upper floors of a nine-storey residential block were destroyed in the city’s Solomianskyi district, where seven people were killed, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said, calling for today to be observed as a day of mourning.

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Two other districts also suffered damage, Klitschko said on the Telegram messaging app, with non-residential facilities, warehouses, a school and a children’s hospital hit.

Power company DTEK said it restored electricity to more than half of the roughly 90,000 homes left without power in the capital following the attack.

The Russian defence ministry said Moscow attacked Kyiv and the surrounding region with airstrikes and drones, hitting facilities producing drone components, a military depot and a logistics hub, as well as other targets.

Meanwhile, Ukraine’s military has hit Russia’s TANECO oil refinery in the Tatarstan region, as well as the Tamanneftegaz oil terminal in the Krasnodar region, the Ukrainian General Staff said yesterday.

The strikes, carried out on Wednesday and overnight, had caused fires at both sites, the General Staff said on the Telegram messaging app.

Diplomatic efforts have failed so far to yield a lasting ceasefire in the war, which started with Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

A drone crashed into Nato and European Union member Romania during the Russian attack on Ukraine, the Romanian defence ministry said yesterday. A drone also crossed Moldova’s airspace, the country’s military said.

Ukraine had handed proposals to US negotiators, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, for a plan to end the war, President Volodymyr Zelensky said this month, and he has also repeatedly asked for interceptor missiles to ward off missile attacks.

Russia did not receive specific proposals for possible new meetings with US negotiators, foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told the Izvestia newspaper, but added that Moscow would be ready to arrange a meeting at short notice.

Witkoff and Kushner were last in Moscow last January and have not yet visited Kyiv.