Russia launches overnight drone strike on Kyiv
Russia launched an overnight drone attack on Kyiv after a 12-day break, a Ukrainian military official said, with air defence systems preliminarily destroying all targets on their approach.
“Another enemy attack on Kyiv,” said Serhiy Popko, a colonel general who heads Kyiv’s military administration. “At this moment, there is no information about possible casualties or damage.”
Witnesses reported hearing blasts resembling the sound of air defence systems hitting targets, but there was no immediate information about the scale of the attack.
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Key events
More details coming in on the Russian drone strike on Kyiv overnight, Ukraine’s air force said the attack included eight Iranian-made Shahed drones and three cruise missiles which were all shot down.
One person was injured and three private houses were also damaged as a result of falling drone debris, the military head of the region, Ruslan Kravchenko said.
Russia has cancelled its 2023 Maks international airshow, likely due to security concerns after recent uncrewed aerial vehicle attacks inside the country, according to the latest intelligence report from the UK Ministry of Defence.
Russia has cancelled the 2023 iteration of Maks, its premier international airshow. Scheduled every other year, Maks takes place near Moscow and showcases Russia’s civil and military aerospace sectors and has become key to securing export customers.
The show has probably been cancelled largely due to genuine security concerns, following recent uncrewed aerial vehicle attack inside Russia. Organisers were highly likely also aware of the potential for reputational damage if fewer international delegations attended.
The war has been exceptionally challenging for Russia’s aerospace community. The sector is struggling under international sanctions; highly trained specialists are being encouraged to serve as infantry in the Roscosmos space agency’s own militia. Meanwhile, Commander in Chief of the Aerospace Forces, General Sergei Surovikin, has not been seen in public since the abortive mutiny by Wagner Group, for whom he served as point of contact with the Russian Ministry of Defence.
The ultra-nationalist Liberal Democratic Party of Russia is working on a bill that would temporarily ban the travel of close relatives of high-ranking officials to “unfriendly countries,” the RIA state news agency reports.
Russia considers all countries that have hit it with sanctions over the invasion of Ukraine to be “unfriendly”.
Restrictions may also affect law enforcement officers, judges, top managers of state corporations, and the board of directors of the Central Bank.
A member of Russia’s lower house of parliament, Sergei Karginov said trips to those western countries are “not only inadmissible, but also dangerous”.
Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy has warned of a “serious threat” that Russia could be ready to provoke a localised explosion at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant.
There is a serious threat because Russia is technically ready to provoke a local explosion at the station, which could lead to a [radiation] release.
Zelenskiy cited Ukrainian intelligence as the source of his information and called for greater international attention to the situation at the facility, the largest nuclear plant in Europe. Since seizing it last year, Moscow has turned it into a military base from which it has bombarded Ukrainian towns across the Dnipro reservoir.
For more on this story:
Russia launches overnight drone strike on Kyiv
Russia launched an overnight drone attack on Kyiv after a 12-day break, a Ukrainian military official said, with air defence systems preliminarily destroying all targets on their approach.
“Another enemy attack on Kyiv,” said Serhiy Popko, a colonel general who heads Kyiv’s military administration. “At this moment, there is no information about possible casualties or damage.”
Witnesses reported hearing blasts resembling the sound of air defence systems hitting targets, but there was no immediate information about the scale of the attack.
Opening summary
Welcome to our continuing coverage of the war in Ukraine, I’m Yang Tian bringing you the latest news.
Russia launched an overnight drone attack on Kyiv after a 12-day pause, a Ukrainian military official said. Air defence systems destroyed all targets on approach as the capital and a number of surrounding regions were under air raid alerts in the early hours of Sunday morning.
More details shortly, in other key developments:
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Vladimir Putin’s admission that the Wagner group had been “fully funded” by the Russian state could make it easier for an international court to prosecute him for war crimes, experts in international law have said. In the year to May 2023 alone, Wagner reportedly received more than 86bn roubles from the state budget, or over a billion dollars.
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Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy has warned that a “serious threat” remains at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant and that Russia is “technically ready” to provoke a localised explosion at the facility. Zelenskiy cited Ukrainian intelligence as the source of his information and called for greater international attention to the situation at the facility, the largest nuclear plant in Europe.
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A 51-year-old man has been killed and two others injured by shelling in Mala Tokmachka, a village near the frontline in the south-eastern region of Zaporizhia, local officials said. The head of the local military administration, Yuriy Malashko, described the site as a “frontline community under merciless enemy fire”.
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US president Joe Biden will host Swedish prime minister Ulf Kristersson next week to talk about transatlantic security cooperation and the war in Ukraine, the White House said. The two leaders “will review our growing security cooperation and reaffirm their view that Sweden should join Nato as soon as possible”.
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Austria, a neutral country, announced its intention to join the European Sky Shield initiative, launched in 2022 by Germany against the backdrop of the war in Ukraine. Austrian chancellor Karl Nehammer said the decision did not call into question the neutrality of the country but cited “a threat that has considerably worsened”. “We must and will take precautions to protect our country against the risk of drone or missile attacks,” he said.
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Spanish prime minister Pedro Sánchez pledged the EU’s “unequivocal” support for Ukraine during a visit to Kyiv on the first day of Spain assuming presidency of the bloc. Sanchez said his visit “demonstrates a clear and unequivocal political commitment” to Ukraine’s bid to join the EU.
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Ukrainian president Zelenskiy has expressed frustration over the slow deliveries of weapons and lack of clarity over pilot training by “some” western nations. “There is no schedule of training missions. I believe that some partners are dragging their feet. Why are they doing it? I don’t know,” Zelenskiy said.
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Two children have been injured in the Russian shelling of a residential area in the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson, according to the regional governor. A nine-year-old girl and a 15-year-old boy were injured and are receiving medical treatment.