Volodymyr Zelenskyy has asked Donald Trump to send Patriot missiles to Ukraine after a devastating Russian attack killed at least 18 people and injured dozens more.
Russia launched 73 missiles and 656 drones at Ukraine overnight, according to the air force, including eight hypersonic Tsirkon missiles. The main targets were Kyiv, the central cities of Dnipro and Zaporizhzhia, and the eastern cities of Poltava and Kharkiv.
Loud explosions rocked the capital, as residents sheltered in basements, corridors and metro stations. Black smoke billowed above the city. Six people died and 66 were injured, the authorities said, including three children.
“A large-scale attack and a completely transparent statement from Russia,” Zelenskyy wrote on social media. “If Ukraine is not protected from ballistic and other missile strikes, these strikes will continue.”
He added: “Europe needs its own anti-ballistic missiles so that this war can finally end. And we definitely need the help of the United States in supplying missiles such as Patriots. We count on the support of our partners and effective responses to today’s strike.”
Ukraine’s president has repeatedly warned that Kyiv is running out of Patriot interceptors, supplied by the US, which are the only air defence system capable of blocking fast-moving enemy ballistic missiles.
Last week he took the unprecedented step of writing to the White House and Congress requesting assistance. Zelenskyy described Patriots as a “vital tool” in saving human lives. Ballistic missiles were Moscow’s “last major advantage on the battlefield”, he stressed.
So far, though, the Trump administration has ignored Zelenskyy’s pleas, with hundreds of scarce and expensive Patriots used up in February during the US-Israeli war against Iran.
On Tuesday, Ukraine’s foreign minister, Andrii Sybiha, said Russia’s latest strikes showed Vladimir Putin was running out of options. In recent weeks, Ukraine has waged an increasingly successful aerial campaign with long-range drones, hitting oil refineries and ports in Russia as well as a crucial land corridor connecting occupied southern Ukraine with Crimea.
Sybiha said: “Putin is a war criminal and loser who has no cards except terror. Moscow is losing on the battlefield. No number of missiles can change this.”
At least 12 people were killed and 36 injured in Dnipro. They included a rescuer who died in the second strike of a “double tap” attack as emergency responders arrived at the scene of first strike. Six people were missing after their four-storey block collapsed on top of them, Zelenskyy said.
The regional governor, Oleksandr Hanzha, posted pictures on social media of heavily damaged residential buildings, burnt-out vehicles and a destroyed children’s playground.
In Kharkiv, at least 14 people were injured and residential homes, garages and cars were damaged.
Kyiv’s mayor, Vitali Klitschko, said a suspected missile strike on a 24-storey block of flats triggered a collapse and people were thought to be trapped under the rubble. Other buildings including a nine-storey apartment block caught fire, he said.
“In the Obolon district, cars are burning after being struck by falling missile debris. There are also fires at two locations in open areas, including one near a kindergarten,” Klitschko said.
In the Podilskyi district, there was partial damage to the upper floors of a nine-storey building, trapping people under the rubble. Rescue operations were under way in the early hours of the morning even as the air raid alert remained in effect.
Olena Dniprovska, 65, and her husband, Yevhen, 64, were injured in their flat in Kyiv’s Podilskyi district during the attack. “I went out into the corridor with the phone and before I understood what happened, everything fell on my head, the glass, and the door blew off,” Dniprovska told Associated Press, dried blood streaked across her face and a bandage wrapped around her chin.
“I ran out into the front door and started calling my husband from the room, but he was also blown out by the blast wave,” she said. “Now I have nowhere to live, the apartment is completely destroyed, no doors, no windows, no balcony. You can step straight from the room out on to the street.”
Electricity was cut for 140,000 residents of the capital, the power company DTEK told Reuters. It later said utility workers had restored power to 110,000 residents, and two of its engineers had been injured.
On Monday, Zelenskyy had reiterated warnings of a potentially major assault and urged residents to pay special attention to air raid alerts. “Intelligence warnings regarding Russian strikes remain in effect. A massive strike is possible, they have prepared one,” Ukraine’s president said in his nightly video address. “Our defenders are ready 24/7 to the fullest extent possible with the supplies currently available.”
Last week Russia said it intended to launch “systematic strikes” on targets in Kyiv linked to the Ukrainian military as well as decision-making centres, and urged foreigners to leave. It came after a drone strike on a dormitory in the Russian-held Luhansk region of Ukraine, which killed 21 people. Ukraine said it had targeted a drone command centre.
Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report
