KYIV — Russia launched a large-scale drone and missile assault on Ukraine starting overnight and continuing into daylight hours on Tuesday, killing at least three people, including a 4-year-old child, and knocking out power across wide areas of the country just two days before Christmas, Ukrainian officials said.
More than 650 drones and dozens of missiles struck residential areas and critical energy infrastructure in at least 13 regions, triggering widespread power outages amid freezing temperatures, according to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Zelenskyy said the attack underscored Russian President Vladimir Putin’s determination to continue the invasion, despite ongoing efforts to advance peace negotiations.
“This is an extremely clear signal of Russian priorities,” Zelenskyy said in a post on Telegram. “A strike before Christmas, when people want to be with their families, at home, in safety. A strike, in fact, in the midst of negotiations that are being conducted to end this war. Putin cannot accept the fact that we must stop killing.”
Ukrainian and European officials have repeatedly accused Moscow of failing to engage sincerely in U.S.-led peace efforts. U.S. President Donald Trump has been pressing for a negotiated settlement, though talks have been complicated by sharply differing demands from Kyiv and Moscow.
U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff said Sunday that discussions in Florida with Ukrainian and European representatives were “productive and constructive,” while Trump said Monday that “the talks are going along.”
Ukrainian emergency services reported that the child was killed in the northwestern Zhytomyr region. A woman was killed by a drone strike in the Kyiv region, while another civilian death was recorded in the western Khmelnytskyi region, Zelenskyy said.
Ukraine’s air force said Russia fired 635 drones of various types and 38 missiles. Air defense systems intercepted 587 drones and 34 missiles, it added.
The assault marked the ninth large-scale Russian attack on Ukraine’s energy system this year, according to acting Energy Minister Artem Nekraso. Multiple regions in western Ukraine were left without electricity, while emergency power outages were imposed nationwide. Restoration efforts will begin once security conditions allow, he said.
Ukraine’s largest private energy company, DTEK, said the attack targeted thermal power plants, marking the seventh major strike on its facilities since October.
Since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, DTEK’s thermal power stations have been hit more than 220 times, resulting in the deaths of four workers and injuries to 59 others.
Regional authorities in Rivne, Ternopil, Lviv and the northern Sumy region reported damage to energy infrastructure and power outages. In the southern Odesa region, regional head Oleh Kiper said Russian strikes hit energy, port, transport, industrial and residential facilities, damaging a merchant ship and more than 120 homes.
Edgardo Hernal started college at UP Diliman and received his BA in Economics from San Sebastian College, Manila, and Masters in Information Systems Management from Keller Graduate School of Management of DeVry University in Oak Brook, IL. He has 25 years of copy editing and management experience at Thomson West, a subsidiary of Thomson Reuters.
- EDGARDO HERNAL
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