This week, fighting continued to rage all along the front lines. Throughout May, Russian drones hit twice as many targets as in the previous month. Russia’s war has killed 631 children in Ukraine, another 2,244 have gone missing, Ukrainian authorities said as the country marked the Day of Remembrance for Children killed by Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine on June 4. A Russian drone strike on the city of Pryluky, in Chernihiv region, on Thursday killed five people, including a 1-year-old child, his mother and grandmother.
Ukraine reclaims the initiative, delivering a series of strikes against Russia’s military targets. Ukraine’s Security Service said it had hit 41 strategic bombers at four Russian airbases on Sunday in the Spiderweb Operation that stunned the world with its audacity. On Tuesday, it hit the Crimean Bridge with explosives planted underwater in a third attack on the facility. Ukraine’s defense intelligence said on Wednesday it hacked into the internal systems of Russia’s major strategic aircraft manufacturer Tupolev. On Thursday, Ukraine hit three Iskander mobile short-range ballistic missile systems in Russia’s Bryansk region. Russia likely intended to use these weapons to launch a missile strike at Ukraine in retaliation for the Spiderweb Operation.
Ukraine can meet up to 40 per cent of its weapons needs with own production, provided it has consistent financing, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyi told a summit of the Bucharest Nine and Nordic countries in Vilnius on Monday.
Russia launches missile, drone strike at Ukraine overnight, killing four people in Kyiv.
Russia launched an intense missile and drone barrage at Ukraine overnight on Friday, killing four people in the capital Kyiv. Three of the four victims were firefighters who died while responding to the attack. At least twenty others were wounded. Falling debris caused damage to six neighborhoods in the city. The air attack triggered a fire on the 11th floor of a residential building in the Solomianskyi district and set a critical infrastructure site in the Holosiyivskyi district ablaze. Operation of a city’s above ground subway line was disrupted after a Russian strike damaged metro tracks. More than 2,000 households on Kyiv’s left bank remained without electricity. Ukraine’s state-owned railway Ukrzaliznytsia said the overnight attack damaged its tracks in Kyiv region and rerouted some of the trains.
In the city of Ternopil, in Ukraine’s west, cruise missiles and drones damaged industrial facilities. Residents were advised to limit their time outdoors after an excess of hazardous substances was recorded in the air. At least ten people were injured in what the local authorities described as the most massive air attack on the region to date. Elsewhere in the country, Russian strikes caused damage to the regions of Lviv, Khmelnytskyi and Poltava, and to the cities of Lutsk and Chernihiv.