Kyiv warns of ‘difficult’ winter as Russian rocket barrage targets energy facilities

KYIV – Ukraine on Thursday warned that difficult winter months lay ahead after a “massive” Russian missile barrage targeted civilian infrastructure, leaving several dead and wounded in towns across the country.

Moscow hit cities from Rivne in western Ukraine to Kherson in the south, the capital Kyiv as well as cities in the centre and north-east of the country.

The attacks killed at least three people in Kherson and wounded many in other parts of Ukraine, with the authorities still searching for victims in some cities.

Russia launched the strikes as Ukraine prepares for another winter during Moscow’s 19-month-long invasion and as President Volodymyr Zelensky made his second wartime trip to Washington.

“Difficult months are ahead: Russia will attack energy and critically important facilities,” said Mr Oleksiy Kuleba, deputy head of Kyiv’s presidential office. He added that Moscow had targeted “civilian infrastructure” across Ukraine.

Ukraine said there were power cuts across the country – in almost 400 cities, towns and villages – as Russia targeted energy sites, but added that it was “too early” to tell if this was the start of a new Russian campaign against its energy sites.

Last winter

saw many Ukrainians without electricity and heating

amid freezing temperatures as Russia hit Kyiv’s energy facilities.

In Kyiv’s eastern Darnitsky district, frightened residents of a dormitory woke up to shattered windows and parked cars outside completely burnt out.

Debris from a downed missile in the capital left seven people, including a child, wounded.

“God, God, God,” Ms Maya Pelyukh, a 50-year-old cleaner who lives in the building, said as she looked at her living room covered in broken glass and debris on her bed.

“The windows and doors were blown away. I was covered with window frames,” she said. “I opened my eyes and started to crawl.”

She looked outside, where firefighters were extinguishing a blaze from the strike.

“There are no soldiers here,” she said, countering Moscow’s claim that it hits only military targets. “This is a dormitory... I don’t know why they are doing this.”

Some residents outside were still in dressing gowns as they watched emergency workers put out a fire that the authorities said spread over 400 sq m.

Ms Daria Kalna held her toddler daughter as she watched workers clear the rubble.

“We thought we were being hit, it was very scary,” she said. “There are no words to describe these emotions.”

3 dead in Kherson

In the southern city of Kherson, the authorities said three people were killed in attacks on residential buildings.

“According to the police, three people died, five more were wounded,” said Ukraine’s Interior Minister Igor Klymenko.

Kherson governor Oleksandr Prokudin said two of the victims were men aged 29 and 41.

The head of the city, Mr Roman Mrochko, later said an 81-year-old woman was also killed.

In the western city of Rivne, considered relatively safe and far from combat zones, the authorities worked to put out a large fire at a car service station.

The authorities said part of the city was without electricity.

Mr Maksym Kozytskiy, governor of the neighbouring Lviv region, said three missiles struck industrial facilities in the city of Drogobych, some 70km from the Polish border.

In the central city of Cherkasy, Mr Klymenko said emergency workers were still “looking for victims who may be under the rubble” after an attack on the city.

Energy fears

The attacks came after more than 1½ years of war, with winter – which can be severe in parts of Ukraine – weeks away.

Ukraine’s energy operator Ukrenergo said 398 settlements were out of electricity as the attacks damaged energy sites across the country.

“There are partial power cuts in Rivne, Zhytomyr, Kyiv, Dnipropetrovsk and Kharkiv region,” it said on Telegram.

But it added that it was too early to tell if Russia has launched another campaign on Ukraine’s energy sites.

Mr Oleksiy Chernyshov, chairman of Ukraine’s main energy company Naftogaz, also urged calm.

“We should calm down. The volume of gas will be enough to last the next heating season,” he said on television.

Russia’s latest missile attacks came as Mr Zelensky was in the United States in

an attempt to win new aid for Ukraine

– which has pressed on with a counter-offensive for months – despite some Western fatigue over the dragging conflict.

Mr Zelensky was also due to meet President Joe Biden and go to the Pentagon to seek more weapons for Kyiv after he

addressed the UN General Assembly in New York,

where he decried Russia’s acts of “genocide”. AFP