At least 8 killed in Kyiv after Zelenskyy warns of ‘massive Russian strike’

At least eight people have been killed and dozens injured in a Russian missile and drone attack on Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, which followed just hours after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned of an impending “massive” attack by Moscow.

Tymur Tkachenko, head of Kyiv’s military administration, said eight people died in the overnight and early morning attacks on Thursday that targeted about three dozen locations across the city.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko, writing on Telegram, said that 34 people were also injured.

“Kyiv is under attack from ballistic missiles and UAVs,” Klitschko wrote earlier, using the acronym for unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones.

Klitschko also reported people trapped ⁠in a damaged nine-storey residential building and the collapse of a large part of a high-rise apartment building that sustained a direct strike.

Journalists with AFP in the central and eastern districts of Kyiv reported hearing more than a dozen explosions as Ukraine’s Air Force warned that ballistic missiles were approaching the city.

Pictures ⁠shared on unofficial Telegram channels showed city residents crowding into underground stations to shelter from the Russian strikes.

In the streets, residents were seen making their way to the shelters, carrying sleeping mats under their arms, according to AFP.

Zelenskyy issues warning before Russian attack

The deadly strikes on Kyiv came just hours after Zelenskyy said he was cutting a visit to Ireland short, warning of an imminent “massive Russian strike” and urged Ukrainians to take shelter.

“Today, we have information about another massive Russian strike; we have relevant intelligence data,” Zelenskyy said during a joint news conference in Dublin with Irish Taoiseach Micheal Martin on Wednesday.

In a post on X, Zelenskyy said: “Immediately after this conversation, I am returning to Ukraine”.

He called on citizens to be “especially careful” and “stay safe and protect your families and children” by heeding air raid alerts.

“We know that [Russian President Vladimir] Putin has been preparing a massive strike against Ukraine for some time. That is exactly the threat we are facing tonight,” he added.

Zelenskyy also accused Russia of “completely refusing to end the war” it launched in February 2022, despite Ukrainian efforts through “all possible official and unofficial channels” to convey readiness for “meetings and meaningful negotiations”.

Putin “sees only further aggression against Ukraine and against other neighbours and Europe as a whole”, Zelenskyy said.

Amid the attacks on Ukraine, neighbouring Poland, a NATO and European Union member, briefly scrambled fighter jets on ⁠Thursday as a preventive measure before calling those back and saying no airspace violation was recorded.