Zelensky warns of 'ugly' Russian attack

KYIV • President Volodymyr Zelensky has urged vigilance ahead of Wednesday's celebrations of 31 years of Ukraine's independence from Soviet rule, as shells rained down near Europe's biggest nuclear plant and Russian forces continued their strikes.

Ukrainians must not allow Moscow to "spread despondency and fear" ahead of the Aug 24 events, which also mark six months since Russia began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Mr Zelensky said in his nightly video address on Saturday.

"We must all be aware that this week, Russia could try to do something particularly ugly, something particularly vicious," Mr Zelensky said.

As the war that has killed thousands and forced millions more to flee heads to the half-year mark, Ukrainian military and local officials reported more Russian strikes overnight on targets in the east and south of the country.

Ukraine's general staff said on Facebook yesterday that over the past 24 hours, Russian forces had conducted several attempted assaults in Donbas.

The eastern border region controlled in part by pro-Moscow separatists has been a prime target of Russia's campaign in the past months.

In the south, Russian forces conducted a successful assault on a village at the border between Kherson and Mykolaiv regions. The city of Mykolaiv was hit with multiple S-300 missiles early yesterday, regional governor Vitaliy Kim said on Telegram.

The area on the Black Sea coast has seen some of the fiercest fighting of the past weeks.

To the north-east, the city of Nikopol, which lies across the Dnipro River from Zaporizhzhia, Europe's biggest nuclear plant, was shelled on five different occasions overnight, regional governor Valentyn Reznichenko wrote on Telegram.

He said 25 artillery shells hit the city, causing a fire at an industrial site and cutting power to 3,000 residents.

The fighting near the Russian-controlled plant and a missile strike at the southern Ukrainian town of Voznesensk on Saturday, not far from the country's second-largest nuclear plant, revived fears of a nuclear accident.

The attack on Voznesensk was "another act of Russian nuclear terrorism", state-run Energoatom, which manages Ukraine's four nuclear energy generators, said in a statement.

Russia did not respond to the accusation. Reuters could not verify the situation in Voznesensk. There were no reports of damage to the power plant.

Mr Zelensky in his Saturday speech also referred obliquely to a recent series of explosions in Crimea, the Black Sea peninsula Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014. Ukraine has not claimed responsibility for the attacks, but analysts have said at least some have been made possible by new equipment used by its forces.

"You can literally feel Crimea in the air this year, that the occupation there is only temporary and that Ukraine is coming back," Mr Zelensky said.

In the latest incident, Crimea's Russian-appointed governor, who is not recognised by the West, said a drone attack on the headquarters of Russia's Black Sea fleet was thwarted on Saturday.

Ukrainian media reported explosions in nearby towns, among them the resorts of Yevpatoriya, Olenivka and Zaozyornoye.

Further west, five Kalibr missiles were fired from the Black Sea in the Odesa region overnight, according to the regional administration, citing the southern military command. Two were shot down by Ukrainian air defences while three hit grain storage areas, but there were no casualties.

Odesa and other ports in the region have been at the centre of a United Nations-brokered deal to allow Ukrainian grain exports, blocked by the war, to reach world markets again.

Talks on arranging a visit to the Zaporizhzhia plant by the United Nations' nuclear agency have stretched more than a week.

REUTERS