Kyiv warned earlier this month about Moscow's increasing use of Iranian-made drones to attack civilian and infrastructure targets.
KYIV, Ukraine — Russia blasted the
Ukrainian capital with a deadly wave of “kamikaze” drones Monday, in a renewed
attack that set apartments ablaze as soldiers fired into the air.
The drones, carrying explosives and their
distinctive buzz, terrorized Kyiv just a week after the Kremlin’s forces
unleashed a deadly barrage against civilian and infrastructure targets across
the country.
Ukraine said the attacks included
Iranian-made drones, which it has accused Moscow of increasingly deploying as
it runs low on precision missiles, and appealed again for Western allies to
provide aerial defensive help.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has
escalated his strikes on Ukrainian cities in the wake of a series of
battlefield setbacks that have weakened his military’s grip on territory Moscow
claims to have annexed, as well as the Kremlin’s hold over the mood at home.
Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said
"kamikaze" drones caused five explosions that rocked the city in the
early morning hours Monday. One of them hit a residential building in the
central Shevchenkivskyi district, he said.
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said
four people — including a young family expecting a child — were killed in the
attack, but he noted that search and rescue operations were still underway.
Infrastructure, housing and civilians appeared to be the target, he added.
"Terror must lose and will lose,"
Zelenskyy said on his official Telegram channel. "And Ukraine will prevail
and will bring to justice every Russian terrorist — from commanders to privates
who carried out criminal orders."
Kyrylo Tymoshenko, the deputy head of the
Ukrainian president’s office, said 19 people were rescued from the building,
and the rescue operation was ongoing.
NBC News has not verified the number of
people killed, injured or rescued.
Authorities worked quickly to clear out
rubble, looking for anyone missing after several floors appeared to have
collapsed. The air was filled with a smell of fire and smoke, as well as dust
from the rubble.
Speaking with NBC News at an intersection
close to the damaged building, Kyiv resident Anna Frolova said the morning was
off “to a horrible start” as she thought the Russians had "enough"
after striking key infrastructure in her city last week.
“It turns out they have not had enough,
and now they are hitting residential buildings as well and people are dying.
And this is scary,” Frolova, 52, said.
“I feel fear, pain, anger and hate,” she
added, vowing to stay in the capital despite the strikes. “Hate toward, I don’t
know, these people who have allowed this to happen in the 21st century. This
medieval war.”
After the first round of air raid sirens
ended around 9:30 a.m. local time (2:30 a.m. ET), life seemed to have quickly
returned to relative normality on what turned out to be a sunny, mild day. The
city’s center was full of cars and people as the threat of another nosediving
drone dissipated, only for the warnings to soon return.
Ukrainian officials also reported rocket
strikes in the southern port city of Odesa, the central Dnipropetrovsk region
and the northeastern Sumy region. Overnight, drone attacks were also reported
by officials in the southern city of Mykolaiv, where deadly rocket strikes last
week destroyed the two top floors of a residential building.
The head of Zelenskyy's office, Andrii
Yermak, called for more air defense systems from the West and "as soon as
possible."
Klitschko shared an image of what he said
was wreckage of one of the drones involved in the attack on Kyiv, displaying a
Russian name for Iranian-made Shahed-136 drones that both Washington and Kyiv
have accused Tehran of supplying to Moscow to be used in Ukraine. Iran has
denied the claims. NBC News could not verify the photo.
The mayor said that, in all, 28 drones
flew in the direction of Kyiv on Monday morning, but the majority of them were
shot down. In total, Russia attacked Ukraine with 42 drones on Monday and 36
were shot down, according to Ukrainian Minister of Internal Affairs adviser
Anton Gerashchenko.
Because the Russian attack also targeted
energy facilities in south and central Ukraine, the country's national energy
company Ukrenergo said it could not rule out the possibility of rolling
blackouts in the affected areas.
Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to
Zelenskyy, said on Twitter that "Iran is responsible for the murders of
Ukrainians, adding that the country "oppresses its own people" and is
now giving Russia "weapons for mass murders in the heart of Europe."
"That is what unfinished business and
concessions to totalitarianism mean," Podolyak tweeted. "The case
when sanctions are not enough."
Russia's Defense Ministry did not directly
acknowledge drone strikes on Kyiv, but said Monday it used "high-precision
long-range air and sea-based weapons" to strike what it said were military
and energy targets in Ukraine.
Zelenskyy warned earlier this month about
Russia’s increasing use of Iranian-made drones, posing a new challenge for the
country’s air defenses and causing concern among Ukraine's Western allies over
Tehran's alleged support for Russia in the war.
The Shahed-136 drones, which have earned
the nickname “kamikaze” for destroying their targets by physically crashing
into them, are relatively cheap and can be equipped with a small warhead,
making them effective precision weapons, military analysts told NBC News.
Their operational range is subject to
debate among analysts, but could be as long as 1,200 miles, although they are
probably much shorter in practice, but still sufficient to hit any target in
Ukraine from Russian-occupied areas.
Yuriy Ihnat, a spokesman for the Air Force
Command of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, said during a briefing Monday that the
country's air defense systems destroyed 85% of the Iranian drones that Russia
had used to attack Ukraine since Sunday evening. NBC News could not verify the
claim.
Last week's attacks were framed by Putin
as revenge for a blast that damaged his signature bridge from Russia to the
annexed Crimean Peninsula.