It launched a new mass attack against Ukrainian energy facilities during the night of Wednesday to Thursday 30/10, causing the death of three people – including a little girl – as well as widespread power outages in the country.
The Russian military, which has invaded the country for three and a half years, has in recent weeks launched a new campaign of strikes targeting the country’s energy grid as winter approaches.
Overnight, “the enemy used more than 650 and more than 50 of various types” to hit “power facilities and ordinary houses” in 10 regions of Ukraine, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy claimed in a social media post.
In the southeastern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhia, where residential buildings were hit, “unfortunately two people lost their lives,” he continued.
Later, the regional authorities of Vinnytsia, in central-western Ukraine, announced the death of a 7-year-old girl, who succumbed to her injuries from the impact at the hospital where she had been taken.
The Russian Ministry of Defense announced that “energy infrastructures that ensure their operation”, as well as “military airports”.
“Russia aims to destroy Ukraine’s energy system”
Russia also announced that it had captured two more villages in northeastern and southern Ukraine, where the Ukrainian army has been losing ground for months.
These are the settlements of Sandove, in the Kharkiv region, and Krasnogirske, in the Zaporizhia region.
Ukraine’s largest private energy group, DTEK, also announced that thermal power plants were “severely damaged” in many regions.
“This attack has dealt a severe blow to our efforts to maintain power supply this winter,” DTEK director Maxim Timchenko noted in a post on X.
“Given the intensity of the attacks of the last two months, it is clear that Russia aims to completely destroy Ukraine’s energy system,” he stressed.
State-owned energy company Ukrenergo initially announced emergency power outages in most regions of the country early this morning, which were later turned into load shedding to restore the balance in the grid between generation and consumption.
In some regions there were also problems with the water supply and the supply of energy for heating. Regional officials also said that two energy facilities in the western region of Lviv were damaged.
“We rely on America, Europe and the G7 countries that they will not ignore Moscow’s intention to destroy everything,” Zelensky noted, calling for stronger sanctions against Moscow.
Prime Minister Yulia Sviridenko also accused Moscow of targeting the Ukrainian people and energy supplies as the cold winter months approach.
“Her goal is to plunge Ukraine into darkness. Ours is to keep the light,” Sviridenko said in a Telegram post. “To stop terror, we need more air defense systems, tougher sanctions and maximum pressure on the attacker,” he added.
In the city of Zaporizhia, the Russian attack injured 17 people “including a 2-year-old girl,” according to a post by the head of the regional administration Ivan Fedorov on Telegram.
An AFP journalist who was present in the city saw an apartment building collapsed and rescuers removing the debris while residents looked at the damage.
The shelling also wounded four adults in the Vinnytsia region and another in the Kyiv region, authorities said.
AFP reporters in Kiev also heard Russian drones flying over the capital overnight.
Ukrainian drones
In total, Russia launched 653 drones and 52 ballistic and cruise missiles, the Ukrainian air force said, adding that it shot down 592 drones and 21 missiles respectively.
The Russian Ministry of Defense announced for its part that it shot down 170 Ukrainian drones overnight, 48 of which were in the Bryansk region, on the border with Ukraine, and 9 in the Moscow region, of which 6 were headed for the capital.
Russia has been bombing populated areas and civilian infrastructure in Ukraine almost daily since February 2022 when it invaded its neighboring country.
Ukraine, whose military faces shortages in manpower and equipment, responds with long-range strikes, usually carried out by drones.
In recent months, Kiev’s attacks have mainly targeted Russian energy infrastructure in an effort to disrupt oil exports and cut funding for Moscow’s war machine.
Last week, Washington and the EU announced sanctions against Russia’s oil sector, hoping to force Moscow to end its incursion.
Ukraine strengthens the defense of Pakrovsk
Ukraine is stepping up its efforts to defend the strategic hub of Pakrovsk, seeking to ensure support for supply and evacuation routes and drive out Russian infantry infiltrating the city, its army chief said today. Oleksandr Sirsky said he visited the region to meet his troops as Russia – nearly four years after invading Ukraine – continued to step up its attacks.
Sirsky denied Moscow’s claim that its forces have trapped Ukrainian troops inside this stronghold in the east. “Enemy infantry, avoiding battles, gathers in urban areas and changes locations, so the main task is to locate and destroy them,” Sirsky said in a post on the Telegram app.
Russia has been slowly advancing on Pokrovsk, in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, for more than a year, slowly but surely taking control of small villages to its south.
On Sunday, Ukraine’s General Staff announced that at least 200 Russian servicemen had entered the city in separate groups as small arms fire raged in the former supply hub. Ukraine is taking steps to “enhance the stability of defense forces” in the city and aims to boost supply by improving the defense of supply and evacuation routes, Sirsky said.
“The main priority is to save the lives of our soldiers,” he said. Supplying the city was complicated by Russian FPV drones “but doable,” Ukraine’s 7th Rapid Reaction Corps, which operates in the area, said in a Facebook statement. The brigade added that Russia used mainly infantry to attack Pakrovsk, but also deployed armored vehicles to advance on Mirnokhrad, about 6 km to the northeast.
