Russia launched a “massive” missile strike at Ukraine overnight, damaging four power plants in the latest barrage targeting the country’s energy supply, officials in Kyiv said yesterday, after US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin on Friday announced that the US would provide Ukraine with additional Patriot missiles.
Two people were killed and at least 10 more were wounded in the Russian shelling.
Moscow has launched some of its largest ever strikes on Ukraine’s energy facilities in the past few months, knocking out a significant chunk of production, and triggering blackouts and energy rationing across the country.
Photo: Reuters
Ukraine also launched more than 60 drones at southern Russia overnight, Moscow said, in one of its largest overnight drone attacks.
Kyiv said it hit two oil refineries and a military air base.
“Russian armed forces staged another massive missile attack on Ukraine,” the Ukrainian army said in its regular morning update.
“The enemy has once again attacked the country’s energy infrastructure. In particular, facilities in Dnipropetrovsk, Ivano-Frankivsk and Lviv regions were attacked. There is damage to equipment,” Ukrainian Minister of Energy German Galushchenko wrote on Facebook.
The Lviv and Ivano-Frankivsk regions are in Ukraine’s west, bordering the EU and hundreds of kilometers from the front lines.
Ukraine’s air force said Moscow had fired 34 missiles, 21 of which were shot down.
Kyiv says Moscow is escalating its attacks from the air and on land ahead of nationwide celebrations on May 9, when Russia marks victory in World War II.
Ukraine also launched its own massive drone attack on Russia’s southern Krasnodar region overnight.
A Ukrainian defense source said its drones had hit two oil refineries and a military airfield in the region, just east of the annexed Crimean Peninsula.
“Ukrainian drones struck the atmospheric distillation columns of the Ilsky and Slovyansky refineries. These are key technological facilities,” the source said.
Russian officials in the Krasnodar region reported a fire at an oil refinery in the town of Slavyansk-on-Kuban.
The refinery partially suspended operations as a result, Russian state media reported.
Meanwhile, the Patriot missiles the US is offering are part of a massive US$6 billion additional aid package. They are be used to replenish previously supplied Patriot systems.
The package also includes more munitions for the National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems and gear to integrate Western air defense launchers, missiles and radars into Ukraine’s existing weaponry, much of which still dates back to the Soviet era.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy discussed the need for Patriots early on Friday with the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, a coalition of about 50 countries gathering virtually in a Pentagon-led meeting.
“It’s not just Patriots that they need; they need other types of systems and interceptors as well,” Austin said. “I would caution us all in terms of making Patriot the silver bullet.”
Austin said he is asking allied nations to “accept a little bit more risk,” as they consider what weapons to send to Ukraine.
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