Ukrainian drones strike Russia as Kyiv reels from massive air attacks
KYIV, Ukraine — Ukrainian drone strikes on southern Russia killed a 9-year-old boy and set fire to a major oil terminal, officials said Saturday, the day after Moscow launched a massive aerial attack on its neighbor that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said was one of the heaviest bombardments of the country’s energy sector in the nearly three-year war.
The boy died when a drone struck his family’s home outside Belgorod, a Russian city near the border with Ukraine, local Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov reported Saturday morning on the Telegram messaging app. His mother and 7-month-old sister were hospitalized, Gladkov said.
He posted photos of what he said was the aftermath of the attack, showing a low-rise house with gaping holes in its roof and front wall flanked by mounds of rubble.
Elsewhere in southern Russia, Ukrainian drones overnight hit a major oil terminal in the Oryol region, sparking a blaze, Ukraine’s General Staff reported. Photos published by the General Staff and on Russian Telegram news channels showed huge plumes of smoke engulfing the facility, backlit by an orange glow.
Ukrainians fear Trump will cut off military aid for the war against Russia, even as Ukraine’s leader aims to win him over with congratulations and praise.
Oryol Gov. Andrey Klychkov confirmed that a Ukrainian drone strike set fire to a fuel depot. He said later the blaze had been contained and there were no casualties.
Russia’s Defense Ministry on Saturday said its forces shot down 37 Ukrainian drones over the country’s south and west the previous night.
Donald Trump calls for an immediate cease-fire in Russia’s war on Ukraine, and the president-elect renews warnings that he’s open to leaving NATO.
Russia pummels Ukrainian energy targets
The Ukrainian strikes came a day after Russia fired 93 cruise and ballistic missiles and almost 200 drones at its neighbor, further battering Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, around half of which has been destroyed during the war. Rolling electricity blackouts are common and widespread, and Zelensky charged Friday that Moscow is “terrorizing millions of people” with such assaults.
Russia has repeatedly attempted to cripple Ukraine’s electricity system in an effort to break the will of civilians left in the dark with no running water or heating and to disrupt Ukrainian defense manufacturing.
Ukrainian Energy Minister Herman Halushchenko said energy workers were doing everything necessary to “minimize negative consequences for the energy system.”
According to Ukraine’s air force, Russia kept up its drone attacks Saturday, launching 132 across Ukrainian territory. Fifty-eight drones were shot down and a further 72 veered off course, likely due to electronic jamming, it said.
The Russian Defense Ministry said its forces used long-range precision missiles and drones on “critically important fuel and energy facilities in Ukraine that ensure the functioning of the military industrial complex.”
For months, Ukraine pleaded for permission to use long-range missiles to strike deeper inside Russia. Now Biden has approved that weapons usage.
The strike was in retaliation for Wednesday’s Ukrainian attack using the U.S.-supplied Army Tactical Missile System, or ATACMs, on a Russian air base, it said.
Kyiv’s Western allies have provided Ukraine with air defense systems to help it protect critical infrastructure, but Russia has sought to overwhelm the air defenses with combined strikes involving large numbers of missiles and drones called swarms.
Russia has held the initiative this year as its military has steadily rammed through Ukrainian defenses in the east in a series of slow but steady offensives.
But uncertainty surrounds how the war might unfold next year. U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, who takes office next month, has vowed to end the war and has thrown into doubt whether vital U.S. military support for Kyiv will continue.
Some 10,000 North Korean troops are in Russia near the Ukraine battleground. How significant is this deployment?
North Koreans reportedly in combat in Kursk
Zelensky said Saturday that a “significant number” of North Korean troops were being deployed by Moscow in assaults in Russia’s southern Kursk region, where Ukrainian troops have held on following a stunning cross-border incursion this summer.
In a televised address, Zelensky said North Korean soldiers have so far not entered the fight on Ukrainian soil, but said they are already taking “noticeable” losses.
Elsewhere, Ukrainian officials reported that Russian shelling on Friday and overnight killed at least two civilians and wounded 14 others in front-line areas Ukraine’s south and northeast.
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