The Ukrainian Air Force says a “serious shortage” of interceptor missiles meant none of the 23 ballistic missiles fired by Russia at Kyiv on Sunday night were shot down.
At least 12 people were killed in the second large-scale Russian attack on the Ukrainian capital in a week, officials said. Six more were killed in the wider Kyiv region.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has appealed for allies to take “strong decisions” at the this week’s Nato summit to provide Kyiv with air defences.
After the strikes, he said the Ukrainian military had been successful in intercepting cruise missiles and drones – but not ballistic missiles.
Sunday’s “massive Russian attack” consisted of 68 missiles and 351 strike drones, he said in a post on X.
Zelensky warned that Moscow would continue to hit residential buildings as long as defensive Patriot missiles “remain in our allies’ stockpiles”.
It was another frightening night for people in the capital, with loud explosions and the boom of Ukraine’s air defences in action.
Once again, many residents sought shelter underground.
Widespread destruction was visible on Monday morning. Three large blocks of flats in the city have partially collapsed, some were hit directly by missiles.
Rescuers have been trying to reach people trapped inside the ruins.
The strikes hit several buildings across the city, Kyiv Mayor Vitaly Klitschko said, adding that fires had broken out in some apartment complexes.
Warehouses and a garage workshop were also damaged, he said.
Helicopters have been shuttling back and forth in the sky, carrying water from the river to douse fires in the city.
Kyiv’s top military administrator, Timur Tkachenko, said 49 were people injured in the capital, with Zelenksy saying there were 16 injuries in the wider region.
Moscow’s latest barrage was repelled by “aviation, anti-aircraft missile troops, electronic warfare and unmanned systems units, and mobile fire groups of the Defense Forces of Ukraine”, Ukraine’s Air Force said.
Preliminary data, recorded at 08:30 local time (06:30 BST), showed 37 missiles and 326 drones were shot down or suppressed, it added.
Hours before the latest strikes, Zelensky had warned that Moscow was preparing a second “massive strike” on Kyiv following its attacks on Thursday that killed 30 people.
After the barrage of drone and missile strikes on Thursday night, tens of thousands of residents evacuated to metro stations around the city as alarms blared in the early hours of Friday morning.
Ukraine accused Moscow of deliberately attacking civilian areas in that attack, which left at least 30 people dead. Russia said it had targeted military and energy bases in retaliation for recent Ukrainian strikes on power stations and energy facilities in Russian territory.
Ukraine has kept up its drone attacks on critical Russian energy facilities, with power being cut off temporarily in the city of Sevastopol in Russian-occupied Crimea.
In addition to the Ukrainian strikes on Crimea, the Baltic oil terminals of Vyssotsk and Ust-Luga, located north and west of St Petersburg, were also targeted again.
Kyiv has been escalating its strikes on targets in the peninsula in an attempt to pressure the Kremlin into peace talks.
So far, it has opted to increase its deadly attacks on the Ukrainian capital instead.
Several reports suggest Zelensky will be meeting US President Donald Trump on the sidelines of the Nato summit, which begins in Ankara in Turkey on Tuesday.
In his post on X on Monday, Zelensky said it was “critically important” that the US and Ukraine’s European partners come to the summit “with strong decisions in support of our air defense, and thus the protection of ordinary people’s lives”.
“The United States and Europe have enough power to stop this terror,” he said.
President of the EU Commission, Ursula von der Leyen said Ukraine’s “urgent” need for more air defence would be discussed at the summit.
Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, and currently controls approximately one-fifth of Ukrainian territory.
By BBC
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