Russia strikes Ukraine energy sites in ‘massive’ barrage

SKNYLIV, Ukraine: Russia launched a wave of missiles and drones at Ukrainian energy facilities on Wednesday, intensifying a months-long bombing campaign at a precarious moment of the war for Ukraine.

The barrage came just one day after Kyiv said it had carried out its largest aerial attack of the war on Russian army factories and energy hubs hundreds of kilometres from the front line.

The Ukrainian air force said Russia launched 43 cruise and ballistic missiles as well as 74 attack drones in the barrage, which targeted sites mainly in western Ukraine.

Oleksandra Komuna, an elderly resident of the western Ukrainian village of Sknyliv, was at home during the attack when lamps and plaster began falling. “All the doors and windows were blown out, everything was blown out. The car was damaged, and the roof was damaged. There were cracks everywhere,” she told AFP. “It´s such a disaster.”

President Volodymyr Zelensky was quick to condemn the strikes and called for more robust security assistance from allies abroad.

“Another massive Russian attack. It is the middle of winter, and the target for the Russians remains the same: our energy sector,” he wrote on social media.