Wave of Russian drone and missile attacks kill at least 15 in Ukraine

BBC:

Russia launched a wave of drone and missile attacks across Ukraine on Wednesday night, killing at least 15 people and injuring about 100, Ukrainian officials said.

A 12-year-old boy was amongfour victims in the capital, and three people were killed in Dnipro in the southeast.

Across the border, two children, aged five and 14, were killed in a Ukrainian drone attack in Russia’s Krasnodar Krai region, its governor Veniamin Kondratyev said on Telegram.

The strikes come after a short ceasefire took place over Orthodox Easter celebrations at the weekend, during which both sides accused one another of hundreds of violations.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko wrote on Telegram that as well as the deaths in the capital, rescuers had pulled a mother and child from the ruins of a 16-storey residential building that collapsed in Kyiv’s central Podilsky district.

In the north of the capital, four emergency medical workers were among those injured.

In an attack on the central city of Dnipro,three people were killed and dozens were injured,Oleksandr Ganzha, head of the regional administration, wrote on Telegram. Pictures posted online showed buildings ablaze in the city.

Elsewhere, missile and drone attacks on the southern port city of Odesa killed eight people, the head of the city’s military administration Sergiy Lysak wrote on Telegram. Attacks on the area began again on Thursday morning, Lysak said.

And in Kharkiv, a drone strike injured a 77-year-old woman and a 66-year-old man, an official said.

Two cities in the south, Mykolaiv and Kherson, have been left without power, according to local officials.

President Zelensky said Ukraine’s armed forces had shot down 636 Russian drones over the previous day and night.

He said a report from Ukraine’s air force showed Russia launched nearly 700 drones, as well as 19 ballistic missiles and other cruise missiles during the night.

Zelensky wrote on X: “Another night that proves Russia does not deserve any softening of global policy or lifting of sanctions.

“Russia is betting on war, and that is exactly how the response should be – we must protect lives with all our might and press for peace with all our might as well.”

The president previously warned on Tuesday that Ukraine was facing a critical shortage of Patriot air defence missiles.