Russian drone attacks kill at least one, wound dozens across Ukraine as Zelenskyy and Putin trade threats

Russian drone attacks across Ukraine have killed at least one person and wounded more than a dozen others, as Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Vladimir Putin threatened to escalate the conflict.

Between Tuesday and Wednesday, Ukrainian authorities reported attacks in the capital, Kyiv, in the southern city of Odesa and in eastern Dnipro, where the body of a man was retrieved from under rubble.

The air war between Russia and Ukraine has intensified as the conflict stretches into its fifth year following Moscow’s invasion of its neighbour. The front line in eastern and southern Ukraine remains largely deadlocked, and US efforts to negotiate a peace settlement have yet to produce a path to peace.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy exchanged threats late on Tuesday over what their next steps might be.

Zelenskyy warned foreign airlines that the skies over Russia are not safe for flights due to Ukrainian long-range drone attacks, saying that “Russian airspace will effectively be closing”. He said Ukrainian military pressure aims to compel Russia to accept peace negotiations.

Putin accused Zelenskyy of “state terrorism” and said: “We don’t negotiate with terrorists.”

At a late-night news conference on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in Kyrgyzstan, Putin also addressed reports that the Ukrainian military had used British-made drones to strike targets inside Russia.

Asked whether Russia would strike British military facilities if the UK government continues to provide Ukraine with weaponry, Putin declined to rule it out. With a small smile, he told reporters it was “a military secret”.

China and North Korea, meanwhile, have provided military support for Russia, as has Iran in previous years.

The Russian and Ukrainian leaders’ comments came as European officials weigh their response to the latest in what they say is Moscow’s campaign of continental sabotage and disruption aimed at weakening European support for Ukraine. Germany on Tuesday blamed Russia for an attempted attack at Leipzig/Halle airport last month using a drone laden with explosives.

Odesa power outage

Russia fired 174 attack drones, about half of them jet-powered drones that are hard to stop and are increasingly being deployed by Moscow, as well as two ballistic missiles and two plane-launched missiles at Ukraine overnight, according to the Ukrainian Air Force.

Officials in the southern Ukraine region of Odesa reported that the attack damaged a 24-storey residential building, destroying apartments on several floors and wounding eight people, including a child.

Odesa office buildings and two educational facilities were also damaged, Serhiy Lysak, head of the Odesa city military administration, said. The barrage also caused a power outage that halted electric-powered public transport, the city council said.

A man and a woman were wounded by shrapnel in morning attacks on the Kyiv region, according to Tymur Tkachenko, head of the regional military administration.

It was the seventh straight day Kyiv came under attack, although the latest barrage wasn’t as heavy as in previous days. The assault started a fire at a warehouse, officials said. Russian forces have targeted civilian facilities in what Ukrainian officials say is an effort to disrupt daily life and sap public morale.

A fire broke out at an educational facility and a medical practice was also damaged, the Kyiv city military administration said.

Meanwhile in Russia, air defences destroyed 130 Ukrainian drones overnight, the Defence Ministry said on Wednesday. The drones were shot down over 11 Russian regions, as well as the annexed Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea and the Black Sea, it said.

Ukrainian drone attacks killed two people in Russia’s Belgorod border region and wounded 16 more, acting governor Aleksand Shuvaev said. Ukrainian forces hit the region 140 times over the course of 24 hours, he said.

Ukraine’s domestically developed long-range drones have repeatedly targeted Russia’s oil sector, hoping to dent the economy and the warehouses of online retailers to make the Russian public feel the effects of war.