At least 37 people have been killed following a Russian strike close to the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv in one of the deadliest attacks to hit Ukraine this year, officials have said. The attack sparked a fire in the Bucha district, west of Kyiv, that swept through homes and damaged at least 50 residential buildings, Tymur Tkachenko, head of the local regional military administration, said. In a statement on the attack, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky said a warehouse had been struck in the village of Myla “followed by a detonation.” He did not give details on the site, but wrote in the same message that Ukrainian law forbade the storage of ammunition close to civilian homes and that criminal proceedings had been opened.
The Ukrainian leader also wrote that a care home for elderly people and people with disabilities had been damaged and that an evacuation from the area was ongoing. Ukrainian prime minister Serhii Koretskyi also didn't offer information on the warehouse targeted, but referenced an attack on the Kyiv suburb of Vyshneve early in July, which hit an ammunition depot, killing 22 and triggering large detonations and fires that tore through nearby homes. And all those guilty, without exception, must be severely punished so that such situations do not happen again.” In a statement, Russia's ministry of defense said it had hit a warehouse in Myla storing components and launch boosters for long-range drones.
It also said that it had attacked the ports of Mykolaiv and Izmail, as well as a logistics center and warehouse facilities storing parts for Ukraine's Flamingo cruise missiles in the Kyiv region. Zelensky later announced that two officials from state-owned companies, including Ukraine’s largest arms producer, Ukroboronprom, had illegally allowed the storage of weapons on the site in Vyshneve and would be held accountable. Three days of almost constant Russian air raids on Kyiv have choked the economy in the Ukrainian capital and severely disrupted civilian life more than four-and-a-half years after Russia’s full-scale invasion of its neighbour.
Russian strikes on the southern Kherson region Saturday killed two people and wounded 27 more, Oleksandr Prokudin, head of the region administration, said in a statement on social media. He said that attacks had damaged homes and apartment blocks, and that one child was among the injured. Earlier in the week, Prokudin said that Russia has intensified attacks on critical infrastructure in the region, which is about 70 per cent under Russian control.
He also urged tens of thousands of residents to move to safer regions because of the possibility of prolonged power and heating outages this winter. Russia has significantly increased its use of jet-powered drones and their numbers will keep growing as Moscow sees their effectiveness, said Pavlo Palisa, deputy head of Ukraine’s presidential office, in comments to journalists on Saturday. We will certainly need to adapt.
It will take time,” Palisa said. He said interceptor drones currently available to Ukraine, which could theoretically intercept jet-powered drones, are not yet to demonstrate the expected effectiveness, though Ukraine is working on solutions. Meanwhile, Ukraine has stepped up its long-range attacks on Russian military industries and energy facilities in recent months, using locally made drones, aiming to cut Moscow’s revenue for its invasion and make Russians feel the consequences.
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