Kyiv is in mourning after a Russian barrage killed at least 17 people
A children's hospital and a school were hit. Zelenskyy says the interceptors for Patriots have not been replaced, and debris crossed into Moldova and Romania.
Kyiv is observing a day of mourning on Friday. Overnight into Thursday, Russia hit the Ukrainian capital and the surrounding region with ballistic, cruise and hypersonic missiles and 168 drones, according to Ukraine's air force, in an attack that lasted close to nine hours. Ukraine's State Emergency Service told the BBC that at least 17 people were killed and more than 40 injured. Regional military administrations, cited by Firstpost, put the nationwide toll over 24 hours at 25 dead and 132 injured.
The upper floors of a nine-storey residential block were destroyed in the Solomianskyi district, where most of the deaths in the capital occurred, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said. Windows were shattered at a children's hospital. A school, a kindergarten and warehouses were damaged. Power went out for thousands of properties. Klitschko told the BBC this was the first time in several months that critical infrastructure in the city "was purposefully attacked." President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia had combined projectiles, cruise missiles and drones to inflict as much damage as possible on civilian infrastructure. The Russian defence ministry said it had used high-precision weapons against military facilities, a transport and logistics centre and warehouses.
An update from the Ukrainian air force on Thursday morning implied that none of the Russian ballistic missiles used overnight were intercepted. Zelenskyy said the interceptors for Patriots had not yet been replaced, and that "as long as Ukraine does not have enough anti-ballistics, Russia will not seriously think about peace." The BBC reported that the United States has used much of its Patriot stockpile in the war with Iran. Klitschko, standing at a wrecked apartment block, said Ukraine needed ammunition and anti-missile systems from its partners.
The attack also spilled over the border. Moldova's president, Maia Sandu, said a drone came down on Moldovan territory. Romania's defence ministry said a Russian drone crashed in an uninhabited part of Tulcea county, near the Ukrainian border, Reuters reported, and an explosive-laden naval drone believed to have been launched by Russia targeted a Romanian offshore gas project, according to CNN. A spokesman for UN Secretary-General António Guterres called the strikes another example of escalating attacks on populated areas.
The number that stays with me is not 17. It is the implication that none of the ballistic missiles were stopped. Ukraine has been asking for Patriots for months, and the stockpile that was supposed to protect Kyiv has been spent on another war. Maybe that is why Russia went back to hitting boilers, schools and the hospital in Solomianskyi. Winter is the point. Officials told the BBC this is the kind of attack Russia was planning ahead of the cold months, to make ordinary life harder. You can mourn on Friday. The heating plant does not wait for the funeral.
Watch whether the United States and European governments actually replenish interceptor stocks, or whether the analysis Romanian foreign minister Oana Toiu described, of allies "not doing enough collectively," remains the official position. Rescue work in Kyiv was still going on under fresh air-raid alarms on Thursday. The death toll can still move.