At least 15 people were killed overnight by Russian missile strikes across central and eastern Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Wednesday morning, describing the attacks as one of Russia’s “most vile” operations. The strikes destroyed a residential building in Pryluky in the Chernihiv region and hit cities including Kyiv, Dnipro, Kremenchuk, Zaporizhzhia and Oleksandriya.
Zelensky said the destroyed Pryluky building was a “birthday ‘gift’ to Putin”, who turns 74 on Wednesday. He added that 70 missiles were fired in total, and that Ukraine had struck targets in Russia’s Perm, Samara and Astrakhan regions in the past 24 hours, with a “response in the Black Sea” as well.
In Pryluky, five people were killed and 26, including five children, injured. Chernihiv Oblast police later reported the death toll rose to nine after three children were recovered. Two people were killed and eight injured in Dnipro and Kremenchuk, and two people were killed in Kyiv and two in Oleksandriya. Ukraine’s national police posted images of an unexploded Russian Iskander missile in a Kyiv district, verified by BBC Verify.
Zelensky urged allies to provide air‑defence support, saying Ukraine’s military had only shot down “some” of the missiles. He noted that a key target of the attacks was Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, and that Moscow had warned it would intensify strikes on Ukraine’s energy facilities.
Separately, footage showed a plume of smoke over an oil tanker off the coast of Sochi, and the Russian transport ministry said unmanned boats had attacked the Liberian‑flagged Aframax Rio oil tanker. Bulgaria halted a search for the missing crew of a ship that sank after a drone attack, but has not identified the attackers. Russia has not commented on the latest incidents.
What to watch: Ukraine and Russia continue to exchange retaliatory strikes, with international allies urged to step up air‑defence aid to Ukraine.
