Russia launched an intense barrage of ballistic missiles and drones overnight into Saturday, killing at least nine people and wounding 33 civilians in the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, authorities said. The strikes follow a major Russian attack two days earlier that killed at least 10 people and wounded more than 50 others across Ukraine, as Moscow apparently looks to exploit Kyiv's critical shortage of Western-supplied anti-ballistic missile defenses, per the AP. The relentless cycle of attacks dims the potential of reaching a diplomatic end to Russia's more than four-year-old invasion of its neighbor.
A five-story residential building in the city's Solomianskyi District was damaged by falling debris and a fire broke out. Rescue workers evacuated 35 people from the upper floors of the building and two people died, with eight reported injured, including two children, according to Ukraine's state emergency service. In the Darnytskyi District, seven people were killed and another 14 injured after the attack caused fires and damage to houses, vehicles, and an administrative and nonresidential building, the emergency services said. Elsewhere, emergency workers extinguished a fire in a nonresidential building in the capital's Shevchenkivskyi District.
There was no additional information about earlier reports by the district mayor that people were trapped in another residential building. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has pressed the US and other Western partners over Ukraine's need for more Patriot anti-ballistic missile defense systems to counter missile attacks from Russia. "Every package of ballistic missile interceptors saves the lives of our people. And every night without them results in more casualties," he wrote on X following the latest attacks.
Late Friday, the Ukrainian leader said he spoke to US Vice President JD Vance and discussed a meeting with President Trump earlier this week in Washington, which Zelensky described as "positive and productive." "The Russian air strikes on our country continue and air defense, specifically interceptors for Patriot systems against ballistic missiles, remains a top priority," Zelenskyy said Friday in a post on Telegram. At a NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey, in July, Trump said the US would give Ukraine a license to make Patriot systems, but he appeared to move away from that commitment on Friday during a Cabinet meeting at the presidential retreat in Maryland's Camp David, saying he hadn't yet made a final decision on the matter. More here.
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