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Russian drone and missile attacks on Ukraine overnight killed at least 10 people, with seven deaths reported in the capital Kyiv, local officials said on Monday.
Ukraine’s air force said Russia fired 352 drones and decoys overnight, as well as 11 ballistic missiles and five cruise missiles. The air force said it intercepted or jammed 339 drones and 15 missiles before they could reach their targets.
Drones and missiles hit residential areas, hospitals and sports infrastructure in several districts across Kyiv in the early hours of Monday, emergency services said.
The most severe damage was in the Shevchenkivskyi district, where a section of a five-story apartment building collapsed and emergency crews raced to find people believed to be trapped under the rubble.
Six people were killed in that district, according to Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said. Ten others, including a pregnant woman, were rescued from a nearby high-rise that also sustained heavy damage in the blast.
Overall, more than two dozen people were injured in the attacks on Kyiv, including four children, according to the city military administration head Tymur Tkachenko.
Another person was reportedly killed and eight wounded overnight in the city of Bila Tserkva, around 85 kilometres southwest of the capital.
And late on Sunday night, a Russian short-range drone attack killed two people and wounded 10 more in the Chernihiv region, authorities said. Three children were among the wounded, according to the regional administration head, Viacheslav Chaus.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy condemned the latest attacks as “completely cynical” and sent his condolences to the families of the victims.
The strikes overnight into Monday come almost a week after a combined Russian attack on Ukraine last Tuesday killed 28 people in Kyiv. Most of the victims died after the residential building they were in collapsed following a direct hit by a missile strike.
Zelenskyy called that attack one of the biggest bombardments of the war, now in its fourth year.
Russian forces have been trying to drive deeper into Ukraine as part of a renewed summer push along the roughly 1,000-kilometre front line, and have also pounded civilian areas with long-range strikes in an apparent bid to weaken public morale.
Two rounds of direct peace talks between Moscow and Kyiv have failed to make progress on ending Russia’s full-scale invasion. Russian President Vladimir Putin said last week that the two sides have agreed to hold another round of discussions soon.
Additional sources • AP
