Russian forces launched a major drone and missile attack on Kyiv overnight, killing 20 people, in what the city's mayor has described as the "most massive attack" on the Ukrainian capital. Vitaly Klitschko said around 90 people were injured. He said an ambulance station was among the places hit in the strikes and declared Friday a day of mourning.
Although previous attacks have killed more people, this latest barrage deployed the largest number of weapons on the capital and hit locations over a very wide area of Kyiv.
Several neighbourhoods were evacuated as strikes rocked buildings throughout the city, hours after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned Russia was preparing an attack.
Moscow said its forces hit what it called military plants in retaliation against attacks on Russian civilian infrastructure.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Thursday that Russia would "continue to increase pressure on the Kyiv regime in order to achieve our set goals".
Ukraine accused Moscow of targeting civilian areas and said it would be wrong to equate the actions of the "aggressor and a country defending itself".
Children were among the "significant number" of casualties, Tymur Tkachenko, the head of Kyiv's military administration, said.
"The enemy is once again deliberately targeting residential areas and killing civilians," he said early on Thursday.
Kyiv's metro authorities said 52,500 people, including 4,500 children, sheltered in underground stations overnight, which they said was the highest number in "recent years".
Among the places hit by the strikes was a high-rise block of flats in south-east Kyiv, part of which was blown off.
In a video posted on Telegram, Klitschko said rescuers were trying to find, among others, a 15-year-old girl and her family.
On the city's left bank, in Darnitskyi district in south-east Kyiv, two missiles hit a residential area directly, causing devastation.
One missile left a giant crater next to a kindergarten and the buildings all around have been gutted by fire, their metal balconies twisted.
The attack on Kyiv lasted more than 11 hours and came in several waves starting with a drone strike on Kyiv's historic quarter, setting off a fire in a hotel in the city centre.
At 01:00 (23:00 GMT on Wednesday), dozens of ballistic and cruise missiles were fired. A brief lull preceded another dozen of cruise missiles at 03:00, followed by a swarm of drones which targeted the capital until dawn.
Residents of Kyiv who have lived through four-and-a-half years of war say they have perceived a change in the pattern of Russia's assaults on the capital over the last two months. Attacks may now happen less frequently - albeit still every few days - but last longer, and seem more powerful and widespread.
source: commonspace.eu with BBC London and agencies.
