Just hours after Ukraine and Russia initiated what is set to become the largest prisoner exchange since the beginning of the war, Kyiv was rocked by a massive Russian missile and drone assault overnight into Saturday. The attack injured at least 15 people and caused widespread damage across multiple districts of the capital, according to Ukrainian officials.
An explosion lights up the sky over Kyiv. PHOTO/COURTESY
The nighttime barrage, which Ukraine’s Air Force described as a concentrated offensive on the capital, involved 14 ballistic missiles and 250 drones launched across the country. While air defenses managed to intercept six missiles and 245 drones, several projectiles still struck urban areas, igniting fires and destroying residential infrastructure.
Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko reported that debris from the attack littered the city, with fires breaking out in several neighborhoods. In Dniprovskyi district, shell fragments damaged an apartment building, while in the northern Obolon district, a blaze engulfed four floors of a high-rise, shattering windows and forcing emergency responses. Debris also fell on a shopping center in the area, and drone fragments were reported in several other parts of the city.
A resident looks at a fragment of a Russian drone, at a residential building that was damaged in the attack. PHOTO/COURTESY
“It was a difficult night for all of Ukraine,” President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Telegram, offering his sympathies to those affected. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha added that air defense forces worked “non-stop” throughout the night. He criticized Russia’s continued aggression just a week after peace talks in Istanbul, stating, “Instead of a peace memorandum, Russia sends deadly drones and missiles at civilians.”
The attacks came shortly after Kyiv and Moscow launched the first phase of a prisoner swap expected to involve 2,000 detainees, 1,000 from each side. The agreement, reached during last week’s Istanbul meeting, was the only significant outcome of the rare direct negotiations between the two countries since Russia’s full-scale invasion began in February 2022. Neither President Zelensky nor President Vladimir Putin attended the summit.
A firefighter works on the site of a residential building damaged in the attack. PHOTO/COURTESY
Meanwhile, Russia’s Ministry of Defense claimed it intercepted 94 Ukrainian drones over its own territory, primarily over Belgorod and Bryansk, with additional UAVs downed in Kursk, Lipetsk, Voronezh, and Tula regions.
The Istanbul talks, initially prompted by a European-backed ceasefire-or-sanctions ultimatum to the Kremlin, yielded little beyond the prisoner swap. Ukraine and its allies continue to call for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire, a demand Moscow has yet to meet.
The prisoner exchange is set to continue through Sunday, even as the conflict’s intensity appears undiminished.
Written By Rodney Mbua
