KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia is engaged in a massive missile and drone attack against Ukraine’s energy infrastructure Thursday, officials said, as fears mount about Moscow’s intentions to devastate the country’s power generation capacity before winter.
“Attacks on energy facilities are happening all over Ukraine,” Energy Minister Herman Halushchenko said in a post on Facebook. He added that emergency power outages are being implemented nationwide.
Explosions were reported in Kyiv, Kharkiv, Rivne, Khmelnytskyi, Lutsk, and many other cities in central and western Ukraine.
The head of Ukraine’s presidential office, Andrii Yermak, said in a Telegram post that Russia had stockpiled missiles to strike Ukrainian infrastructure and wage war against civilians during the cold season. “They were helped by their crazy allies, including from North Korea,” he wrote.
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Over 280,000 households in the northwestern Rivne region are currently without electricity because of the attack, said the regional head, Oleksandr Koval. There are also interruptions to water supplies in affected areas. Some schools in Rivne city have been instructed to study remotely Thursday.
There were also strikes on the bordering Volyn region, where 215,000 households have no electricity, said the head of administration, Ivan Rudnytskyi. All critical infrastructure that lost power has been switched to generators.
Local officials ordered opening the “points of invincibility” — shelter-type places where people can charge their phones and other devices and get refreshments during blackouts.
In Kyiv, where the air raid alert lasted over nine hours, missile debris fell in one of the city’s neighborhoods, local officials said. No casualties were reported.