Russia launched a massive air raid on Ukraine on Tuesday, killing three people and knocking out power in most regions. A four-year-old child was among the three killed in the attack that started on Monday evening and stretched into Tuesday morning, local officials said.
Russia sent a massive barrage of 650 drones and over 30 missiles into Ukraine, prompting neighbouring Poland scramble its fighter jets to protect its air space, the country’s military said in a statement.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy slammed the attack that was launched ahead of Christmas holiday celebrated in both countries. “A strike before Christmas, when people want to be with their families, at home, in safety. A strike, in fact, in the midst of negotiations that are being conducted to end this war. Putin cannot accept the fact that we must stop killing,” Zelenskiy said. The Ukrainian leader stressed that the attack highlighted Putin’s intention of pursuing the invasion of Ukraine and not to engage in peace negotiations to end the nearly four-year-old war.
The attack knocked out power in most Ukrainian region causing widespread outages in bitter temperatures. Capital Kyiv and other cities have been experiencing scheduled power cuts for weeks amid reduced power capacity during the winter months, with temperatures forecast to drop to minus 5 Kyiv on Wednesday.
Power outages were also reported in southern port city of Odesa where Russia hit a number of infrastructure targets and damaged 100 houses. The city has been targeted by Russian air raids in the past few weeks.
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