Seven Killed as Russia and Ukraine Trade Intensified Aerial Strikes
Russian strikes killed four across Ukraine, including two in Zaporizhzhia and two in Sumy, while a Ukrainian drone attack on Russia's Krasnodar region killed three.
Russian attacks across Ukraine killed four people on Saturday, Ukrainian officials said, as Moscow and Kyiv continued to intensify their aerial campaigns against each other.
Two women died in Zaporizhzhia when they were trapped under the rubble of their destroyed home, according to the region's military administration. A separate strike on the city of Sumy killed two more people, local officials said.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia had carried out "numerous strikes on residential homes" in Kyiv and Zaporizhzhia, as well as in the Odesa, Sumy and Kharkiv regions. Writing on Saturday morning, he urged Ukraine's partners not to lose focus on the war, warning that Russia was escalating daily and that the world needed to respond more forcefully to prevent the conflict from spreading.
His appeal followed an address at the United Nations earlier in the week, where he called on countries to cut off Russia's revenue through sanctions and trade bans, arguing that Moscow must be denied the money it needs to sustain the war. Despite years of diplomatic efforts, there is still no sign of a breakthrough to end the fighting.
Elsewhere in Ukraine, a Russian drone attack overnight caused a fire at a warehouse in the Boryspil district of the Kyiv region, injuring two people. Drones also struck several districts of the capital itself, wounding four and damaging residential and office buildings, officials said.
Russia's Ministry of Defense said its attack on Kyiv had damaged a data center that supported mobile internet services and Starlink satellite communications.
Ukraine, meanwhile, has increasingly used long-range drones to target Russian oil refineries and businesses. A Ukrainian drone attack on the southern Krasnodar region killed three people and wounded two, local officials said. Regional Governor Veniamin Kondratyev said on Telegram that the strike sparked fires at two industrial sites without providing further details. Russian media later reported that a local oil refinery was the target.
The exchange comes more than four years after Moscow launched its full-scale invasion, a period in which Russia has pounded Ukraine with cruise and ballistic missiles, glide bombs and jet-powered drones while its progress along the front line has slowed.