Kyiv: Russia launched a massive aerial attack against Ukraine on Wednesday, forcing the country to introduce preventive power cuts, the Ukrainian energy minister said. The scale of the strike was not immediately clear.
“The enemy continues to terrorize Ukrainians,” Herman Halushchenko wrote on Facebook, urging residents to stay in shelters during the air raid alerts and follow official updates.
The state energy company Ukrenergo reported emergency power outages in the Kharkiv, Sumy, Poltava, Zaporizhzhia, Dnipropetrovsk, and Kirovohrad regions.
Russian forces launched missile strikes targeting energy infrastructure in the western Lviv region early Wednesday, said the city’s mayor, Andrii Sadovyi. “During the morning attack, enemy cruise missiles were recorded in the region,” he said.
Lviv regional head Maksym Kozytskyi said Russia hit and damaged two infrastructure facilities in the area of Drohobych and Stryi. No casualties were reported, he added.
Ukraine’s air force detected multiple missile groups launched by Russia during a nationwide air-raid alert, though initial reports indicated no damage. Wednesday’s attack has further exacerbated the strain on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, which has been a frequent target during the nearly three-year-old war.
During the almost 3-year war, Russian forces have persistently attacked Ukraine’s energy infrastructure to plunge the country into darkness and exhaustion during the winter months.
