War in Ukraine: at least 8 killed in Russian bombing, some with “kamikaze drones”

Russian attacks, including some with “suicide” drones, left at least eight dead and damaged several electrical installations in Ukraine on Monday, a week after a wave of massive bombings. In total, throughout the day, “the enemy carried out nine missile strikes, 39 air strikes, (fired) up to 30 shells from multiple rocket launchers,” the General Staff of the Ukrainian army summed up in the evening.

In addition to the capital, kyiv, the suburbs of Kharkov and Sumy (northeast), Donetsk (east), Dnipropetrovsk (central-east), Kherson and Mikolaiv (south) were hit, it added.

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Crucial infrastructure in three regions, including kyiv, was hit, leaving “hundreds of towns” without power, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Chmygal said.

A drone approaches for an attack in kyiv, Ukraine, on October 17, 2022, amid the Russian invasion. (Yasuyoshi CHIBA / AFP).

The latter reported “five drone attacks” of alleged Iranian manufacture in the capital alone.

The Russian army congratulated itself on having hit all of its targets with “high-precision weapons.”

Meanwhile, in southwestern Russia, a Russian supersonic fighter-bomber crashed into a residential area near the Ukrainian border, leaving at least three people dead.

Russia is launching successive waves of Iranian-made Shahed drones over Ukraine. (AP).

Russia ‘kills civilians’

Russia “kills civilians, hits houses and infrastructure”, denounced the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky.

Among the dead “there is a family that was expecting a baby,” added the president. The mayor of kyiv, Vitali Klitschko, confirmed that among the deceased was a woman who was six months pregnant.

“The enemy can attack our cities, but he will not break us,” he said. Zelensky.

According to the Ukrainian emergency services, a suicide drone also hit an administrative building in kyiv.

Smoke rises from a building after a drone strike in kyiv on October 17, 2022, amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. (Yasuyoshi CHIBA / AFP).

AFP journalists in kyiv saw drones flying over a central neighborhood of the capital and police officers firing at them with automatic weapons.

“We have been here for maybe half an hour and four drones have fallen,” explained one of the policemen, Iaroslav, still nervous. “It’s a little scary, but it’s our job… We have to do it.”

The new UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, who began his mandate on Monday, asked not to target civilians.

The attacks come a week after Russia launched a two-day bombing spree that hit towns across Ukraine, causing power and water cuts across the country.

The bombings left at least 19 dead and 105 wounded and sparked international outrage.

“It seems that now we are attacked every Monday,” said taxi driver Sergiy Prikhodko, as he waited outside kyiv’s central railway station.

Last week’s bombings occurred, according to Putin, in retaliation for the explosion that damaged the strategic bridge linking Russia with the Crimean peninsula, annexed by Moscow.

A man falls after a drone strike in kyiv on October 17, 2022, amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. (Yasuyoshi CHIBA / AFP).

Iran sanctions

The head of Ukrainian diplomacy, Dmytro Kuleba, called on Twitter for more sanctions to be imposed against Iran “for having supplied drones to Russia.”

Iran denies that it is supplying weapons to Moscow and insisted again on Monday that “it has not exported weapons to any of the parties to the conflict,” according to Nasser Kanani, a spokesman for the Iranian Foreign Ministry.

After the attacks, the chief of staff of the Ukrainian presidency, Andriy Yermak, indicated that the country needed “more anti-aircraft defense systems as soon as possible.”

“The Russians think this is going to help them but it just shows their desperation,” he wrote.

Yermak also welcomed the increase in military aid from the European Union (EU) to Ukraine and the launch of a training mission for his country’s soldiers.

At a meeting of European foreign ministers in Luxembourg, the European bloc approved a training mission on its territory for 15,000 Ukrainian soldiers and to provide another 500 million euros for weapons to kyiv.

Ukraine has launched a counteroffensive in recent weeks that has allowed it to recover large swaths of territory in the east and south of the country.

The troops from kyiv are now closing in on Kherson, the only major Russian-held Ukrainian city north of Crimea. The region is one of four Ukrainian territories that Moscow claimed as annexed areas.

And in Belarus, an ally of Moscow, the Defense Ministry announced that up to 9,000 Russian soldiers and about 170 tanks would be deployed on its territory to defend the country against what Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko sees as possible threats from Ukraine.

Source: Elcomercio