Major Russian attack in Ukraine kills over a dozen, hits British Council : NPR
The firefighters work on the site of a fire building after a Russian attack in kyiv, Ukraine, early Thursday.
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Kyiv, Ukraine – Russia launched a great air attack early Thursday against kyiv which included a rare strike in the city center, killing at least 21 people, injuring 48 and damaging the diplomatic offices of the European Union, the authorities announced.
The bombing of drones and missiles was the first great Russian attack on kyiv in a few weeks while the peace efforts led by the United States to end the three-year war had struggled to gain ground. Great Britain said the attack has sabotaged peace efforts, while the high diplomat of the Kaja Kallas summoned the EU of Russia to Brussels about the strikes that damaged the EU offices.
Ukraine asked on Thursday an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council to discuss night bombardment, while of the best Ukrainian envoys were to meet on Friday with the Trump administration concerning mediation.
The Kremlin said that Russia had remained interested in pursuing peace talks despite Thursday’s air attack, which was one of the greatest war since it started in 2022.
Among the dead were four children between 2 and 17 years old, said Tymur Tkachenko, the chief of the city of kyiv. He said that more people could still be under the rubble and that research and rescue efforts continued on Thursday evening.
Rare attack in the center of Kyiv
A man wears a sofa in his apartment damaged by a Russian strike in kyiv, Ukraine on Thursday.
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Evgeniy Maloletka / AP
The attack was one of the rare Russian Russian drones and missiles has penetrated kyiv’s heart since the start of the large -scale invasion.
Ukraine, the Air Force said that Russia had launched 598 drones and typing lures and 31 missiles of different types across the country early Thursday, most of them striking targets in kyiv.
At least 33 locations in the 10 districts of the city have been directly affected or damaged by debris, said Tkachenko. Thousands of broken windows while nearly 100 buildings have been damaged, including a shopping center in the city center.
Oleksandr Khilko arrived on the scene after a missile struck the residential building where his sister lives in the Darnytsia district of the capital. He heard people of people trapped under the rubble and released three survivors, including a boy.
“It’s inhuman and striking civilians,” said Khilko, his clothes covered with dust and the tips of her black soot fingers. “With each cell in my body, I want this war to end as soon as possible. I expect, but each time the alarm of the air raid sounds, I’m afraid.”
Sophia Akylina said her house in the kyiv Holosiivskyi district had been damaged.
“It has never happened before they attacked so close,” said the 21 -year -old. “The negotiations have not yet given anything, unfortunately, people suffer.”
The EU and the United Kingdom invoke Russian envoys after the strikes hit their buildings
The president of the European Commission, Ursula, Von der Leyen, said that two strikes landed at 20 seconds at around 50 meters (165 feet) from the EU mission to the building in Ukraine in kyiv. She said that no personal had been injured during the strike.
“No diplomatic mission should never be a target. In response, we invoke the Russian envoy to Brussels,” Kaja Kallas, the best diplomat in the European Union on Thursday in an article on X.
The British Council, which promotes cultural relations and educational opportunities, also said that its kyiv office had been “seriously damaged” in the attack and was closed to visitors until further notice.
The organization posted a photo showing the building with its windows and its entrance opened and surrounded by glass and debris. A guard was injured and is “shaken but stable”, the director general of the Council Scott McDonald posted on X.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said Russian President Vladimir Putin “saboto” hopes of peace after “insane” strikes. The Russian ambassador to London was summoned to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Diplomatic efforts to reach peace have blocked
Thursday’s attack is the first major combined attack of Russian drones and missiles to strike kyiv since US President Donald Trump met Putin in Alaska earlier this month to discuss the end of the Ukraine war.
“Russia chooses ballistics instead of the negotiating table,” said Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy in a position on X after the attack. “We expect a response from everyone in the world which has called for peace but which remains more often silent rather than taking positions in principle.”
While a diplomatic thrust to end the war seems to take momentum shortly after this meeting, few details have emerged on the next steps.
Western leaders have accused Putin of hanging out his feet in peace efforts and avoiding serious negotiations while Russian troops moved deeper in Ukraine. This week, Ukrainian military leaders have conceded that Russian forces have transformed in an eighth region of Ukraine seeking to capture more land.
The firefighters work on the site of a fire building after a Russian attack in kyiv, Ukraine, early Thursday.
EFREM LUKATSKY / AP
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Zelenskyy hopes that more difficult American sanctions paralyze the Russian economy if Putin does not demonstrate the gravity of the end of the war. He reiterated these requests after Thursday’s attack.
Trump bristled this week at Putin’s Stalling on an American proposal for direct peace talks with Zelenskyy. Trump said on Friday that he expects to decide on the next steps in two weeks if direct talks are not scheduled.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said Thursday that he was “clear that a meeting between President Zelenskyy and President Putin would not take place”.
The white house press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, criticized Putin and Zelenskyy after Thursday’s attack on kyiv.
She said Trump “was not happy with this news, but he was not surprised either” by Russia’s air assault on the Ukrainian capital.
Leavitt has noted that Ukraine has also launched effective assaults against the Russian oil industry in recent weeks.
“Perhaps the two sides of this war are not ready to put an end to it,” said Leavitt. “The president wants it to end, but the leaders of these two countries … must want it to end too.”
Russia says it has targeted the “military-industrial complex”
The Russian Defense Ministry said that it had a strike against military air bases and businesses “in the Ukraine industrial military complex” using long -range weapons, including Kinzhal missiles.
“All the designated objects have been affected,” the ministry said in a statement.
Ukraine has increased the production of interior weapons to combat the invasion of Russia. Many weapon factories work secretly, some integrated into civil zones with upper air defenses. The blind Russian attacks that claim to target the Ukrainian defense industry killed many civilians.
The Russian Defense Ministry also said that they had killed 102 Ukrainian drones overnight, mainly in the southwest of the country. A drone attack sparked a fire in the Afipsky oil refinery in the Krasnodar region, local officials said, while a second fire was reported in the Novokuibyshevsk refinery in the Samara region.
Ukrainian drones have repeatedly struck refineries and other oil infrastructure in recent weeks in order to weaken the war economy of Russia, which increases service stations in certain Russian regions and prices.
Ukraine’s national railway operator, Ukrzaliznytsia, reported damage to its infrastructure in the Vinnytsia and kyiv regions, causing delays and forcing trains to use alternative routes.
