Russian missile and drone attack kills 15 and injures dozens in Ukraine

A night-time Russian missile and drone bombardment of Ukraine has killed at least 15 people and injured 156 others while they slept in their homes, local officials said.

At least 14 people were killed as explosions echoed across the Ukrainian capital for almost nine hours during the night, Kyiv City Military Administration head Tymur Tkachenko said.

The bombardment demolished a nine-storey residential building, destroying dozens of apartments.

Russia fired more than 440 drones and 32 missiles at Ukraine, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said, calling the Kyiv attack “one of the most terrifying strikes” on the capital.

Ukraine’s Interior Ministry said 139 people were injured in Kyiv. Mayor Vitali Klitschko announced that Wednesday would be an official day of mourning.

It was one of the deadliest attacks on Kyiv in recent months and came after two rounds of direct peace talks failed to make progress on ending the war, now in its fourth year.

Russia has repeatedly hit civilian areas of Ukraine with missiles and drones. The attacks have killed more than 12,000 Ukrainian civilians, according to the United Nations. Russia says it strikes only military targets.

Russia has in recent months stepped up its aerial attacks. It launched almost 500 drones at Ukraine on June 10 in the biggest overnight drone bombardment of the war. Russia also pounded Kyiv on April 24, killing at least 12 people in its deadliest assault on the capital in eight months.

The intensified long-range strikes have coincided with a Russian summer offensive on eastern and north-eastern sections of the 620-mile front line, where Ukraine is short-handed and needs more military support from its western partners.

Uncertainty about US policy on the war has fuelled doubts about how much help Kyiv can count on.

Mr Zelensky was set to meet US President Donald Trump at a G7 summit in Canada on Tuesday and press him for more help, but the White House announced Mr Trump would return early to Washington on Monday night because of tensions in the Middle East.

Mr Zelensky is trying to prevent Ukraine from being sidelined in international diplomacy as tensions escalate in the Middle East and concerns remain over US trade tariffs.

Mr Trump said earlier this month it might be better to let Ukraine and Russia “fight for a while” before pulling them apart and pursuing peace, even as European leaders have urged him to pressure Russian President Vladimir Putin into accepting a ceasefire and compromising in peace talks.

Ukraine’s foreign minister, Andrii Sybiha, said Russia’s attacks during the G7 summit showed Mr Putin’s “total disrespect” for the US and other countries.

“Russia not only rejects a ceasefire or a leaders’ meeting to find solutions and end the war. It cynically strikes Ukraine’s capital while pretending to seek diplomatic solutions,” Mr Sybiha wrote on social media.

Ukrainian forces have hit back against Russia with their own domestically produced long-range drones.

The Russian military said it downed 203 Ukrainian drones over 10 Russian regions between Monday evening and Tuesday morning.

Russian civil aviation agency Rosaviatsia reported briefly halting flights overnight in and out of all four Moscow airports, as well as the airports in the cities of Kaluga, Tambov and Nizhny Novgorod, as a precaution.

The overnight Russian drone strikes, meanwhile, also struck the southern Ukrainian port city of Odesa, killing one person and injuring 17 others, according to Oleh Kiper, head of the regional administration.

Mr Putin “is doing this simply because he can afford to continue the war”, Mr Zelensky said. “He wants the war to go on. It is troubling when the powerful of this world turn a blind eye to it.”

The Russian attack delivered “direct hits on residential buildings,” the Kyiv City Military Administration said in a statement.

A US citizen died in the attack after suffering shrapnel wounds, interior minister Ihor Klymenko told reporters.

Thirty apartments were destroyed in a single residential block after it was struck by a ballistic missile, Mr Klymenko said.

“We have 27 locations that were attacked by the enemy. We currently have over 2,000 people working there, rescuers, police, municipal services and doctors,” he told reporters at the scene of one of the attacks.

Olena Lapyshniak, 49, was shaken from the strike that nearly levelled her apartment building. She heard a whistling sound and then two explosions that blew out her windows and doors.

“It’s horrible, it’s scary, in one moment there is no life,” she said. “There’s no military infrastructure here, nothing here, nothing. It’s horrible when people just die at night.”