No fewer than 30 people have been killed and scores wounded after Russia launched a massive air attack over Ukraine across the country in the fiercest assault since the first days of the war nearly two years ago.
Schools, a maternity hospital, shopping arcades and blocks of flats were among the buildings hit in the barrage, said Ukrainian officials.
The attacks — during which a Russian missile passed through Polish airspace — triggered international condemnation and fresh promises of military support to Ukraine, which has been fighting off invading Russian troops since late February 2022.
“Today Russia hit us with almost everything it has in its arsenal,” President Volodymyr Zelensky said.
Ukraine’s military estimated Russia had launched 158 missiles and drones on Ukraine and 114 of them had been destroyed.
Air force spokesman Yuriy Ignat told reporters that this was a “record number” of missiles and “the most massive missile attack” of the war, excluding the early days of constant bombardment.
Russia tried to overwhelm Ukraine’s air defences across most major cities, launching a wave of Shahed attack drones followed by missiles of numerous types fired from planes and from Russian-controlled territory.
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Interior Minister Igor Klymenko announced on Telegram: “As of now, 30 people have been killed and more than 160 wounded as a result of Russia’s massive attack on Ukrainian territory in the morning.”
Late Friday, Russian authorities said a strike on a residential building in Belgorod, 80 kilometres (50 miles) north of the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, had left one dead and four wounded.
A total of 13 missiles were intercepted over the Belgorod region while 32 drones were downed overnight in the Bryansk, Kursk and Oryol regions north of the border and in the Moscow region, according to the Russian defence ministry.
Russia’s army said it had “carried out 50 group strikes and one massive strike” on military facilities in Ukraine over the past week, adding that “all targets were hit”.
The United Nations condemned the attacks and said they must stop “immediately”.
“Regrettably, today’s appalling assaults were only the latest in a series of escalating attacks by the Russian Federation,” said UN assistant secretary-general Mohamed Khiari.
Poland reported that a Russian missile passed through its airspace.
“Everything indicates that a Russian missile entered Polish airspace… It also left,” said General Wieslaw Kukula, chief of the general staff of the Polish armed forces.
After speaking to Polish President Andrzej Duda, NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg said the alliance “stands in solidarity” with Poland, adding: “NATO remains vigilant.”
In the face of sustained Russian assaults, Ukraine is urging Western allies to maintain military support.
Ukraine presidential aide Andriy Yermak said Kyiv needed “more support and strength to stop this terror”.
US President Joe Biden called on Congress to overcome its division to approve new aid for Ukraine, after Washington released its final package of weaponry under existing agreements still to be renewed by Congress.
“Unless Congress takes urgent action in the new year, we will not be able to continue sending the weapons and vital air defence systems Ukraine needs to protect its people,” Biden said.
“Congress must step up and act without any further delay.”
Britain announced it would send hundreds more air-defence missiles to Kyiv, after Prime Minister Rishi Sunak declared that “We must continue to stand with Ukraine — for as long as it takes”.
The strikes targeted at least six Ukrainian regions including Kharkiv in the northeast, Lviv in the west, Dnipro in the east and Odesa in the south.
In the capital Kyiv seven people were killed, according to Mayor Vitali Klitschko, with damage to Lukyanivska metro station near the Artyom arms factory that Russia said it targeted early in the war.
Rescuers worked through the afternoon to pull people from under the rubble of a warehouse in the Shevchenko district, according to the city administration.