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Deadly Russian strikes pound Ukraine for second day, as Kyiv claims land, settlements in Kursk
- Russia’s massive drone and missile strikes on Ukraine killed 4, triggering blackouts, and spurring Kyiv’s call for Western weapons
Russia fired a wave of attack drones and missiles at Ukraine that killed at least four people, authorities said on Tuesday, after a second night of heavy strikes across the war-battered nation.
Within hours of the barrage, Ukraine claimed fresh advances in its surprise assault on Russia’s Kursk border region and reported taking nearly 600 Russian troops as prisoners in the past three weeks.
“Crimes against humanity cannot be committed with impunity,” President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a post on social media, reporting on Tuesday four killed and 16 wounded.
Zelensky also said that his military had recently carried out the first successful test of a domestically-produced ballistic missile.
“There has been a positive test of the first Ukrainian ballistic missile. I congratulate our defence industry on this. I can’t share any more details about this missile,” he said at a press conference in the Ukrainian capital.
Monday’s attack was one of Moscow’s largest-ever on Ukraine, prompting Kyiv to push for allies’ permission to use Western-provided weapons to strike deep inside Russia.
Local authorities said, earlier, that two people had been killed in the southeastern Zaporizhzhia region and two in the central city of Kryvyi Rig after a missile struck a hotel.
The hotel strike comes just days after a team working for the Reuters news agency were hit by a missile in their hotel in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk, killing a safety adviser working with the agency.
The Russian attacks on Monday triggered widespread blackouts and spurred condemnation from Ukraine’s allies in Europe and the United States.
Russia said the attack had targeted infrastructure linked to the Ukrainian military. Nato member Poland said its airspace was violated during the barrage, probably by a drone.
Since invading in February 2022, Russia has launched repeated large-scale drone and missile attacks on Ukraine, including punishing strikes on energy facilities.
Ukraine’s electricity grid operator said on Tuesday that emergency blackouts would be applied throughout the day to reduce pressure on the grid following the fresh attacks that damaged energy infrastructure nationwide.
Local Ukrainian authorities said separately that three civilians had been killed in the Dnipropetrovsk, Kharkiv and Kherson regions in Russian drone and artillery attacks.
Ukrainian forces have been pushing their offensive in Kursk, a surprise operation that has seen Kyiv gain swathes of territory in three weeks.
The governor of Russia’s Belgorod region, which borders Kursk and Ukraine, said Tuesday he was aware of reports that the Ukrainian army had tried to cross the border.
“Information has emerged that the enemy is trying to break through the border of the Belgorod region,” its governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said.
“According to the Russian defence ministry, the situation on the border remains difficult but under control,” he said on social media.
Zelensky said late on Monday that Ukraine’s cross-border incursion launched on August 6 was partially to “compensate” for Kyiv’s inability to strike deeper into Russian territory.
He has been appealing to Ukraine’s allies to allow his forces to use Western-supplied weapons to strike targets inside Russian territory as part of efforts to thwart more aerial bombardments.
Ukraine’s army chief Oleksandr Syrsky said his forces had made fresh gains in Kursk recently and now controlled 100 towns and villages across 1,294 square km (500 square miles).
He also claimed that Russian forces had redeployed some 30,000 troops to help fend off the Kursk incursion, and said Ukraine had taken 594 POWs in the weeks of the incursion – the first time Kyiv has offered a precise figure.
Moscow has nonetheless been making steady gains in Ukraine and said Tuesday that its forces had captured the village of Orlivka near the strategic railway hub of Pokrovsk.
Zelensky had said late Monday that defending Pokrovsk was “difficult” and that Ukraine was strengthening its positions there as Russian forces advance.
This week, journalists saw civilians evacuating by train from Pokrovsk, once home to around 60,000 people, with panicked residents carrying their belongings in bags and pets with them.
Ukraine war: India’s Modi urges Putin for swift end to conflict after Kyiv visit
The prime minister’s urging of a swift end to the Ukraine conflict highlights India’s balancing act between Russia and the West
New Delhi has avoided explicit condemnations of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, instead urging both sides to resolve their differences through dialogue.
Modi said he had “exchanged perspectives on the Russia-Ukraine conflict” with Putin and shared “my insights from the recent visit to Ukraine”, in a post on social media.
He said he had “reiterated India’s firm commitment to support an early, abiding and peaceful resolution of the conflict”.
India and Russia have maintained close links since the Cold War, which saw the Kremlin become a key arms provider to the South Asian country.
Russia has also become a major supplier of cut-price crude oil to India since the Ukraine conflict began, providing a much-needed export market after the imposition of Western sanctions.
That has dramatically reconfigured their economic ties, with India saving billions of dollars while bolstering Moscow’s war coffers.
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