Ukraine updates: Russian air assault kills 5, Zelenskyy says

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Sunday slammed Western allies for their lack of a "real response" to ongoing Russian attacks on his country after Moscow launched more than 500 missiles and drones overnight.

Russia's attacks hammered infrastructure, including power plants, leaving some 110,000 Ukrainians without electricity.

Bemoaning Western complacency and "zero real reaction from the world," Zelenskyy said, "This is exactly why [Russian President Vladimir] Putin does it: He simply laughs at the West, at its silence and the absence of decisive countermeasures."

"Russia is openly trying to destroy our civilian infrastructure, and right now, before winter, it is targeting gas infrastructure, power generation and transmission," said the Ukrainian leader.

Speaking of the "increasing scale and audacity" of Russian attacks that killed five civilians and injured 18 more overnight, Zelenskyy said: "Russians are not even trying to conceal their true intentions. The overwhelming majority of targets were civilian objects and ordinary infrastructure." 

Beyond calling for further sanctions, Zelenskyy also railed against his allies' inability to keep the Western components integral to Russia's invasion from getting into Putin's hands.

"The nearly 500 drones that the Russians used overnight contain more than 100,000 components manufactured abroad," he said, noting that such "components are still being supplied from Western countries and various neighboring countries of Russia."

Slovakia's Prime Minister Robert Fico has again criticized the European Union's approach toward Russia.

He told local media that he does not wish to see Moscow defeated but wants to prevent another large-scale war in Europe.

Fico said the war in Ukraine is "not our war," in a television interview aired on Sunday on public broadcaster STVR.

He expressed alarm by "how carelessly people are talking more about war than about peace today."

Slovakia — along with Hungary — has refused to stop purchasing Russian oil despite calls from EU partners and US President Donald Trump to do just that.

In March, Fico said the Slovak government would not support Ukraine financially or militarily to continue fighting Russia.

He has pledged that Slovakia would not be roped into any "war adventure" while he remains prime minister.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Moscow's ties with Washington would be considerably damaged if the US supplied Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine for long-range strikes deep into Russia 

"This will lead to the destruction of our relations, or at least the positive trends that have emerged in these
relations," Putin said in a video clip released on Sunday by Russian state television reporter Pavel Zarubin.

US Vice President JD Vance said last month that Washington was considering a Ukrainian request to obtain Tomahawks, which have a range of 2,500 kilometers (1,550 miles),.

This would make it possible for Ukraine to attack the Kremlin and all of European Russia.  

It is unclear if a final decision has been made on whether to deliver the weapons to Kyiv.

However, the Wall Street JournaI reported last week that the US would provide Ukraine with intelligence on long-range energy infrastructure targets in Russia.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Sunday that Russia had launched more than 50 missiles and about 500 attack drones at Ukraine overnight, killing five people and injuring at least 10 others.

"The Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk, Zaporizhzhia, Chernihiv, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson, Odesa, and Kirovohrad regions were all targeted," Zelenskyy wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

"Today, the Russians once again targeted our infrastructure — everything that ensures normal life for our people. We need more protection and faster implementation of all defense agreements, especially on air defense, to deprive this aerial terror of any meaning," he wrote.

He called on the US and Europe to act "to make [Russian President Vladimir] Putin stop."

The Russian Defense Ministry said that its attacks had targeted only "Ukrainian military-industrial facilities" and gas and energy infrastructure.

Russia has always denied targeting civilians or civilian infrastructure during its invasion of its neighbor, which it launched in February 2022.

The attacks overnight to Sunday did badly damage energy infrastructure in Ukraine, cutting off power supplies to tens of thousands as Russia steps up its attempts to make heating difficult with winter approaching.
      

Two people were killed in an overnight Russian attack on the Lviv region in western Ukraine, local governor Maksym Kozytskyi said.

In addition to the death, two people had also been injured in the drone and missile strike, Kozytskyi posted on Telegram.

"We'll forever remember the victims," reads the message on the governor's official channel.

The major city of Lviv and its surrounding region have been regularly bombarded since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Lithuania's Vilnius Airport announced that its airspace had reopened after a closure in the early hours of Sunday, with Lithuanian media reporting it was due to balloons possibly flying in the airspace.

"The airspace at Vilnius Airport was opened 04:50 [0150 GMT]," the airport said on its website.

Flights were redirected to other airports, including Riga and Kaunas, national broadcaster LRT reported.

Read more about the closure of the airport here.

Russia launched more strikes on Ukraine on Sunday.

One woman was killed and nine others were wounded in a "combined strike" on the southeastern region of Zaporizhzhia, regional head Ivan Fedorov said on Telegram.

An air raid alert was in effect for the whole of Ukraine, the armed forces said.

In neighboring Poland, the armed forces scrambled fighter planes and put their ground forces on high alert in areas near Ukraine as a result of the Russian attack.

"These actions are preventive in nature and are aimed at securing the airspace and protecting citizens, especially in areas adjacent to the threatened region," Poland's armed forces said on X.

Moscow has increasingly targeted Ukraine's energy infrastructure as temperatures start to drop.

Last week, Russia attacked Ukraine's gas infrastructure in the largest strike of the war so far. 

Shelling on Saturday, meanwhile, saw power cut off to approximately 50,000 households in Chernihiv.

Welcome back to our coverage of Russia's war in Ukraine.

Early this morning, Poland scrambled jets as Russia continued its attacks on neighboring Ukraine, killing at least one.

We will continue to bring you the latest on the war, including news, videos and analyses.

Russia blasted Ukraine's northern energy infrastructure overnight with drone attacks near Chernihiv, leaving some 50,000 households without power Saturday morning.

Regional energy supplier Chernihivoblenergo wrote on the messaging app Telegram that electricians are currently working to repair damage.

Moscow claimed it was targeting facilities supporting Ukraine's war effort, though Ukrainian officials, like Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko, accuse the Kremlin of "terrorizing civilians." 

Ukrainian armed forces officials say the nearly 500 drones that Russia launched on Friday and Saturday are designed to destroy support for Kyiv's defensive war by making life as difficult as possible for everyday Ukrainians as winter approaches.

Moscow's current approach is part of an annual ritual repeated each fall since Russia launched its unprovoked full-scale invasion, namely seeking to do as much damage as possible to civilian infrastructure in time for the coldest stretch of the year.

Ukraine targeted the Kirishinefteorgsintez, or Kinef Oil Refinery, outside St. Petersburg on Saturday, setting off a blaze at the facility, one of the largest in Russia.  

Regional Governor Alexander Drozdenko confirmed the attack in a social media post. The fire was later extinguished.

The refinery is located in the northwestern Russian city of Kirishni and owned by the Kremlin-linked oil company Surgutneftegas.

The facility can process some 20 million tons of oil annually. Saturday's attack was the second on Kinef in recent weeks.

Attacks were also launched against an industrial site in southern Russia. 

Authorities say they downed a total of 117 Ukrainian drones over the course of the evening.

Kyiv has increased its use of cheap drones to hammer Russia's vital oil sector, disrupting Russia's own energy supply while also robbing it of important the petro funds that finance its illegal war against neighboring Ukraine.

It is estimated that Ukraine has successfully shut down as much as one-quarter of Russia's oil processing facilities.

Some 30 people were injured Saturday in the northern Ukrainian city of Shostka when a Russian drone slammed into a passenger train parked at the city's rail station. 

In a video of a smoldering rail car, Ukrainian President Voldymyr Zelenskyy said  dozens of passengers and railway workers had been injured in the incident, which caused fires and blasted glass and metal across the platform.

"A savage Russian drone strike on the railway station in Shostka, Sumy region," Zelenskyy's post read. 

"The Russians could not have been unaware that they were targeting civilians. This is terrorism, which the world has no right to ignore," Zelenskyy continued in a post on Telegram.

Medics and rescue service workers were on the scene.

Russia has conducted near daily strikes on Ukraine's rail system over the past two months and has generally increased attacks since President Vladimir Putin met with US President Donald Trump in Alaska in mid-August for talks that Trump said were designed to end the war.

Welcome to DW's coverage of the latest regarding Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Stay tuned for not only news, but also analysis and multimedia content pertaining to the conflict.   

On Saturday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy released a video of smoldering passenger train cars at the Shostka Railway Station in the country's north, decrying Russian direct attacks on civilians.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian drones struck one of Russia's largest oil refineries, sparking fires that were later extinguished.

That came after Russia again carried out overnight attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure that left some 50,000 civilians without power.