President Zelenskyy acknowledged the interception of many drones and missiles but highlighted Ukraine’s urgent need for enhanced air defense systems, particularly against ballistic missiles.
Russian attacks across Ukraine killed six people, including a child, and wounded 29 others overnight, Ukrainian officials said on Saturday, as Kyiv also claimed to have damaged more than two dozen Russian vessels in the Sea of Azov. Ukraine’s General Staff said overnight strikes damaged 21 tankers used to transport oil and petroleum products, as well as four tugboats, two cargo ships and a dredging vessel.
Russia disputed the scale of the attack, saying only four ships had come under attack and that one person had been killed in the Ukrainian drone strikes.
In Ukraine’s north-eastern Sumy region, four people, including a child, were killed and 17 others injured after two aerial glide bombs struck a crowded civilian area, according to regional governor Oleh Hryhorov.
In Kyiv, 11 people, including one child, were injured in overnight missile and drone attacks, Ukraine’s State Emergency Service said. Explosions and fires were reported in the capital’s Solomianskyi, Darnytskyi and Dniprovskyi districts.
In the southern Odesa region, two people were killed after a Russian missile hit a building, regional governor Oleh Kiper said. Another man was wounded by shrapnel.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia launched 12 missiles, including six ballistic missiles, and 121 drones overnight.
He said most of the drones and some of the missiles had been intercepted, but the ballistic missiles reached their targets, again highlighting what he described as Ukraine’s critical shortage of air defence systems.
Ukraine’s air force said it had shot down or electronically suppressed two missiles and 111 drones, adding that direct hits were recorded at 11 locations.
Russia’s Defence Ministry said its forces had targeted drone production facilities in Kyiv, as well as the ports of Izmail and Chornomorsk in Ukraine’s Odesa region.
The ministry also said Russian air defences destroyed 178 Ukrainian drones overnight over eight Russian regions, as well as over the Russian-annexed Crimean Peninsula and the Black and Azov seas.
Ukraine, which is critically low on munitions for its Patriot air defence systems, has been largely unable to down ballistic missiles, which travel at several times the speed of sound, over the past month.