Sergey Kozlov / EPA
More than a million without electricity. Ukraine this morning denounced a “massive attack” on energy infrastructure, and authorities decided to cut electricity at a time when Moscow intensifies military pressure.
Hundreds of thousands of people were left without electricity today in western Ukraine, hundreds of kilometers from the front line of the conflict, following a Russian air strike against the country’s energy distribution facilities.
With temperatures around 0°C, “once again, the energy sector was subjected to a massive attack by the enemy”, stated the Ministry of Energy on the social network Facebook.
They were carried out emergency power cuts especially in Kiev (north-central), Odessa (south) and Dnipro (east), according to Ukrainian operator DTEK.
Rivne regional authorities said 280,000 people were without electricity and had water cuts. In the neighboring Volyn region, 215,000 inhabitants were left without access to electricity, according to local authorities. In total, more than a million people will have been left without electricity.
Furthermore, a nationwide air alertwith the Ukrainian air force reporting missile attacks that mainly targeted the regions of Odessa, Kherson, Mykolaiv (south) and Kirovograd (center).
The Russians “were helped by crazy allies, including North Korea“, wrote the head of the Ukrainian presidential office, Andri Yermak, on social media.
On Tuesday, Moscow announced “a response” to two new Ukrainian attacks with ATACMS missiles Americans against Russian territory in the previous days.
Russia is bombing civilian areas across Ukraine as winter approaches, particularly targeting energy infrastructure.
Biden calls for military mobilization from the age of 18
The Russian Defense Ministry, in turn, claimed to have destroyed 25 drones Ukrainians overnight over the Bryansk region, near Belarus, Crimea and the Rostov region (south).
On the battlefront, Moscow is making territorial gains against one, less than two months before the inauguration of the next US president, Donald Trump.
The administration of the outgoing President, Joe Biden on Wednesday asked Kiev to lower the minimum age for military mobilization to 18 years old, instead of the current 25to compensate for the lack of soldiers given the advance of Russian forces on the ground. This call comes at a time when Trump may adopt a new approach and push Kiev to negotiate with Moscow.
