Zelensky accuses Russia of ‘doing what it does best… killing innocent civilians’ as missiles rain down across the country again – leaving entire city without water and power
- Russia peppered Ukraine with missile and drone strikes overnight, officials said
- Kyiv, Kharkiv, Dnipro, Mykolaiv, Zhytomyr all hit in attacks on energy and water
- City of Zhytomyr – population 230,000 – is completely without power or water
- Zelensky accused Russia of trying to sow terror after defeats on the battlefield
Russia has peppered Ukraine with missiles again today in what appears to be a deliberate campaign to take out its energy and water networks as winter sets in, as President Zelensky accused Moscow of killing innocent civilians.
Kyiv, Kharkiv, Dnipro, Mykolaiv, and Zhytomyr all reported being hit by a mixture of missiles and suicide drones overnight Monday and Tuesday morning, knocking out electricity and hot water supplies as the weather turns colder.
Zhytomyr, located 80 miles west of Kyiv and with a population of 230,000, was completely without power and water early Monday according to the city’s mayor.
President Zelensky, speaking overnight, said Russia ‘doesn’t have any chance on the battlefield and is trying to compensate for its military defeats with terror.
Smoke rises over Kyiv early Tuesday after more Russian drone and missile attacks on the capital overnight, targeting water and energy supplies
‘They continue to do what they do best – terrorise and kill civilians,’ he added on Telegram. ‘The terrorist state will not change anything with such actions.’
Russian strikes against civilian targets have stepped up markedly in the last 10 days, following a string of humiliating retreats on the battlefields and an attack which hit the Crimea Bridge – a pet project of Putin’s that symbolised his power.
It appears that, having failed to defeat Kyiv’s army, Moscow is now trying to break the will of Ukrainian people to continue the war – likely in the hopes of pushing Zelensky to accept a peace deal that will favour Russia.
Two explosions rocked an energy facility in the southeastern city of Dnipro, a city of nearly 1 million, causing serious damage, according to Kyrylo Tymoshenko, a Ukrainian presidential aide.
In the southern Ukrainian port of Mykolaiv, a missile slammed into an apartment building killing at least one man, a Reuters witness said, and blasts were heard and smoke seen rising in Kyiv, the capital.
There were also reports of power facilities being targeted in the city of Kharkiv, a city with a pre-war population of 1.43 million people, close to the Russian border.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy accused Russia of terrorising and killing civilians with the air attacks, which came a day after drone strikes on Kyiv and other cities killed at least four people.
‘Ukraine is under fire by the occupiers. They continue to do what they do best – terrorise and kill civilians,’ Zelenskiy wrote on the Telegram messaging app.
‘The terrorist state will not change anything for itself with such actions. It will only confirm its destructive and murderous essence, for which it will certainly be held to account.’
There was no immediate word on how many people had been killed in the strikes.
Russia earlier this month named General Sergei Suvorikin as overall commander of what Moscow calls its ‘special operation’ in Ukraine. Suvorikin served in Syria and Chechnya where Russian forces pounded cities in a scorched earth policy against its foes.
Nicknamed ‘General Armageddon’ by the Russian media because of his alleged toughness, his appointment was followed by the biggest wave of missile strikes against Ukraine since Moscow invaded on Feb. 24.
Russia carried out its latest strikes on Tuesday after the United States warned it would hold Moscow accountable for any war crimes.
Moscow denies targeting civilians. Its defence ministry has said it is carrying out attacks on military targets and energy infrastructure across Ukraine using high-precision weapons.
In the port city of Mykolaiv, a Reuters witness said they had heard three explosions in the early hours of Tuesday.
A missile had completely destroyed one wing of a building in the downtown area, leaving a massive crater, they said. A fire crew was seen pulling the dead body of a man from the rubble.
‘In Mykolaiv, the enemy destroyed a residential building with S-300 missiles. A person died. There was also a strike at the flower market, the chestnut park. I wonder what the Russian terrorists were fighting against at these absolutely peaceful facilities?’ Zelenskiy said.
The Russian strikes followed advances by Ukrainian forces in the east and south and came after an Oct. 8 blast on a bridge linking mainland Russia to Crimea – the peninsula Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014.
U.S. President Joe Biden’s press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters on Monday that the White House ‘strongly condemns Russiaâs missile strikes’ and spoke of Putinâs ‘brutality’.
Putin sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24 in what he called a ‘special operation’ to root out what it calls dangerous nationalists.
Ukrainian forces have mounted stiff resistance, with the help of arms supplied by the United States and its allies, who have also imposed sweeping sanctions on Russia in an effort to force it to withdraw.
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