Kyiv rocked by one of Ukraine war’s largest Russian air attacks
Russian missiles and drones strike the capital and Odesa, including maternity ward
Russia launched one of its largest air strikes on Kyiv in over three years of war and struck a maternity ward in the southern city of Odesa in attacks that killed at least three people, officials said on Tuesday.
The overnight strikes followed Russia’s biggest drone assault of the war on Ukraine on Monday, and were part of intensified bombardments that Moscow says are retaliation for attacks by Ukrainian forces on Russia.
The Russian attack also damaged Saint Sophia Cathedral, a Unesco World Heritage site located in the historic centre of Kyiv, Ukrainian Culture Minister Mykola Tochytsky said.
“The enemy struck at the very heart of our identity again,” Mykola Tochytskyi wrote on social media about the site he called “the soul of all Ukraine”.
Loud explosions shook Kyiv and blasts and fires lit up the sky in the early hours of Tuesday morning, leaving palls of heavy smoke over the city, Reuters witnesses said.
At least four people were treated in hospital after seven of the capital’s 10 districts were hit, city officials said.