Russia launched massive drone and missile attacks on Ukraine on Friday night, days after Vladimir Putin pledged to respond to Spiderweb operation targeting military airbases deep in Russia.
At least four people, three of them emergency workers, were killed in the capital Kyiv, as Russia launched over 400 drones and more than 40 cruise ballistic missiles at the country, in what became one of the largest coordinated Russian attacks in the three years of war. Twenty people were injured in the attack with search and rescue operations ongoing at several locations, Kyiv’s mayor, Vitali Klitschko, said on Telegram. Around 50 people were injured across Ukraine as a result of the attack.
Posting on social media on Friday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy called for pressure on Russia. “If someone does not put pressure and gives the war more time to take lives, they are complicit and responsible. We need to act decisively,” Zelenskiy wrote.
The air attack also triggered fires in residential buildings in different parts of Kyiv, disrupted the work of metro, left more than 2,000 households in Kyiv’s eastern bank without electricity, local authorities said. Ukrainian forces shut down up to 30 of the cruise missiles and up to 200 of the drones, Ukrainian air force spokesperson Yurii Ihnat revealed.
The Russian Defence Ministry said the attack was in response to what it described as Ukrainian “terrorist acts”, in a clear reference to Ukraine’s massive drone attacks, striking over forty strategic bombers across four military bases deep in Russia last week. On Wednesday, Vladimir Putin informed his US counterpart Donald Trump that there would be response for the attack. “They went deep into Russia and Putin actually told me we have no choice but to attack based on that, and it’s probably not going to be pretty,” Trump told reporters after nearly seventy-minute phone conversation with Putin.
