Russian attacks leave one million Ukrainians without power

RFI

28 November 2024 at 3:44 am·1-min read

A man shines a flashlight as he and his son walk down the dark street during a blackout in Kyiv caused by a "massive" aerial barrage amid Russian invasion in Ukraine.

More than a million Ukrainians were left without power in freezing cold temperatures on Thursday after a massive nationwide Russian missile and drone attack.

Ukraine is bracing for what could be its toughest winter of the almost three-year war as Moscow steps up its aerial bombardment of the war-torn country and its troops advance on the frontlines in the east.

"There are emergency blackouts all over the country due to the enemy's attack on our energy sector. There is no end in sight," said the CEO of the Yasno energy supplier Sergey Kovalenko.

President Volodymyr Zelensky's chief of staff said Russia was "continuing their tactics of terror", seeking to plunge Ukrainian civilians into darkness and cut of heating in the coldest months of the year.

"They stockpiled missiles for attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure, for warfare against civilians during... winter," Andriy Yermak said in a post on Telegram.

The combined missile and drone attack, launched in waves throughout the early hours of Thursday, knocked out electricity for more than a million subscribers in Ukraine's west, hundreds of kilometres from the front lines.

"As of now, 523,000 subscribers in Lviv region are without electricity," regional head Maksym Kozytskyi said on social media.

'Massive enemy attack'

The western region, which borders EU and NATO member Poland, has been spared the worst of the fighting of Russia's 33-month invasion but has been targeted in Russian drone and missile attacks sporadically.

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'Massive enemy attack'

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