Deadly Russian attack rocks Kyiv as Ukraine lobbies for aid
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Russia launched 18 missiles and around 400 drones in an attack which primarily targeted the capital Kyiv.
PHOTO: EPA
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KYIV – Hundreds of Russian drones and more than a dozen missiles rained down on the Ukrainian capital early on July 10, killing two people in a second massive air strike on Ukraine in two days, as Kyiv seeks critical aid from its partners at a meeting in Rome.
In the attack, 19 people were wounded and damage was reported in nearly every district of Kyiv.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the assault had involved around 400 drones and 18 missiles, primarily targeting the capital.
Explosions and anti-aircraft machine gun fire rattled the city.
Windows were blown out, facades ravaged and cars burned to shells, including in the city centre where an apartment in an eight-storey building was engulfed in flames.
“This is terror because it happens every night when people are asleep,” said Ms Karyna Volf, a 25-year-old Kyiv resident who rushed out of her apartment moments before shards of glass showered her home.
Ukrainian air defences stopped all but a few dozen of the drones, the authorities said.
Escalating Russian attacks have strained Ukrainian air defences at a perilous moment in the war, now in its fourth year.
They also forced residents in Kyiv and elsewhere across the country to seek cover in bomb shelters overnight.
The July 10 attack came a day after Russia launched a record 728 drones at Ukraine
“Residential buildings, vehicles, warehouse facilities, office and non-residential buildings are on fire,” Mr Tymur Tkachenko, head of Kyiv’s military administration, said on the Telegram messaging app.
Russia’s Defence Ministry said it had hit “military-industrial” targets in Kyiv, as well as military airfields.
Rome conference
Mr Zelensky and other top Ukrainian officials were in Rome on July 10 for a recovery conference to lobby Kyiv’s allies for more critical defensive weapons and investment in Ukraine’s war-hit economy.
Mr Zelensky urged European allies to “much more actively” use Russian assets frozen during the war for Ukrainian reconstruction.
After US President Donald Trump pledged earlier this week to send more defensive weapons to Kyiv, Washington resumed delivery of artillery shells and mobile rocket artillery missiles
Ukraine is also seeking more Patriot air-defence systems that have proven critical to defending against fast-moving Russian ballistic missiles.
Women sitting at a bus stop in Kyiv damaged during Russian drone and missile strikes on July 10.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Mr Zelensky, who said he had a “substantive” talk with US envoy Keith Kellogg on July 9, will also meet American officials to discuss potential new US sanctions on Russia, Ukraine’s foreign minister said.
Mr Trump has been growing increasingly frustrated with President Vladimir Putin, saying that the Russian leader was throwing a lot of “bullshit” at the US efforts to end the war that Moscow launched against Ukraine in February 2022.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio met Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov
