Kyiv, Ukraine — A week after Russia organized large, coordinated air attacks across the country, several loud explosions shook the core of the Ukrainian capital on Monday.
Vitaliy Klichko, the mayor of Kiev, stated that the central Shevchenko neighborhood of the capital city had been struck and asked citizens to seek cover.
According to the Reuters news service, he stated that numerous residential buildings were on fire and that rescuers were on the scene.
No other information was immediately available.
The explosions occurred in the same central Kyiv neighborhood where a week earlier a missile damaged a children’s playground and junction near the main campus of Kyiv National University.
Posts on social media depicted a fire in the location of the suspected attack, with black smoke billowing into the early morning sky.
Andrii Yermak, the chief of the Ukrainian president’s office, posted on the social media service Telegram that “Russian soldiers attacked Kiev with Iranian Shahed drones.”
According to Agence France-Presse, he remarked, “The Russians believe it would benefit them, but it reveals their desperation.”
On October 17, 2022, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine, smoke rises from a partially demolished building in Kiev. via Getty Images: YASUYOSHI CHIBA/AFP
In recent weeks, Russia has regularly employed so-called suicide drones to target urban centers and infrastructure, including power stations.
In recent days, combat has risen in the eastern districts of Donetsk and Luhansk, and the Ukrainian counteroffensive has continued in the southern provinces of Kherson and Zaporizhia.
In his evening address last night, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy reported that intense fighting was occurring in the cities of Bakhmut and Soledar in the Donetsk area. Donetsk and Luhansk comprise the majority of the industrial east known as the Donbas and were two of four territories annexed by Russia in September in violation of international law.
On Sunday, the Russian-backed authority in the Donetsk area reported that Ukraine had shelled its administrative center. There were no casualties reported.