Searchlights and air-defence fire strafed the sky over Ukrainian cities on Monday amid another Russian attack using scores of explosive “suicide” drones, as Nato’s outgoing chief urged the West not to be cowed by the Kremlin’s nuclear sabre-rattling.
Ukrainian officials said 67 of 73 drones and one of three Russian missiles were shot down during an air raid alert that lasted for five hours before dawn in Kyiv, as the capital and several other major cities and 11 regions came under fire.
No injuries were reported but an unspecified critical infrastructure site in the southern Mykolaiv region was hit, adding to the toll on key Ukrainian facilities ahead of a winter when damage done to Ukraine’s power grid is expected to cause long blackouts.
Moscow fired more than 1,300 powerful Shahed drones – which are imported from Iran and produced in Russia – at Ukrainian cities in September, which is the highest such monthly total of its 2½-year invasion.
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Ukraine continued clear-up work after Russian air strikes on Sunday on the cities of Zaporizhzhia and Sumy injured a total of at least 26 civilians. On Saturday, a double air strike on a hospital in Sumy killed at least 10 people and wounded 22 others.
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“Every day, Russia uses about a hundred guided aerial bombs against Ukraine. And this is a constant reminder to all our partners who can help that we need more long-range capabilities for Ukraine. We need more air defence for Ukraine, we need more sanctions against Russia,” said Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
He returned from last week’s visit to the White House with a pledge for about $8 billion (€7.2 billion) more in US military aid but without any public sign that Washington had granted his request to use western-supplied missiles to hit military targets deeper inside Russia.
Ukraine has used domestically made drones to strike several large weapons depots hundreds of kilometres inside Russia in recent weeks, and Moscow said it intercepted 125 Ukrainian drones over Russian regions on Sunday.
However, the US says the risk of “escalation” is too great to allow western missiles to be used for such tasks, and the Kremlin has threatened to retaliate to any such move and even to consider potentially using its nuclear arsenal in response.
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“What we have seen is a pattern of reckless Russian nuclear rhetoric and messaging, and this fits into that pattern,” said Jens Stoltenberg, who will be replaced as Nato secretary general next week by former Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte.
“Every time we have stepped up our support with new types of weapons – battle tanks, long-range fires or F16s – the Russians have tried to prevent us,” he said. “They have not succeeded and also this latest example should not prevent Nato allies from supporting Ukraine.”
Russian president Vladimir Putin repeated baseless claims on Monday that his invasion of Ukraine was a defensive move in response to “lies, forgery and deception on the part of western elites, who… turned Ukraine into their colony, into a military base aimed at Russia.”
“I thank all citizens of the country for this unity and patriotic spirit. The truth is on our side. All the goals that have been set will be achieved,” he added, on the day when Russia marks what it calls its “reunification” with illegally occupied areas of Ukraine.
Ukraine’s new foreign minister, Andrii Sybiha, visited Hungary to try to improve ties with the most Kremlin-friendly state in the EU and Nato.
“We are committed to developing pragmatic and predictable good-neighbourly relations,” Mr Sybiha said.
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