Russian missiles again target Kyiv

Attack done for attention, officials say

Firefighters work at the scene of a residential building following explosions, in Kyiv, Ukraine, Sunday, June 26, 2022. Several explosions rocked the west of the Ukrainian capital in the early hours of Sunday morning, with at least two residential buildings struck, according to Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)
Firefighters work at the scene of a residential building following explosions, in Kyiv, Ukraine, Sunday, June 26, 2022. Several explosions rocked the west of the Ukrainian capital in the early hours of Sunday morning, with at least two residential buildings struck, according to Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)


KYIV, Ukraine -- Russia shattered weeks of relative calm in the Ukrainian capital with long-range missiles fired toward Kyiv early Sunday, an apparent Kremlin show-of-force as Western leaders meet in Europe to strengthen their military and economic support of Ukraine.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said the missiles hit at least two residential buildings, and President Volodymr Zelenskyy said a 37-year-old man was killed and his wife and 7-year-old daughter were injured. Associated Press journalists saw emergency workers battling flames and rescuing civilians.

The strikes also damaged a nearby kindergarten, where a crater pocked the courtyard.

Later Sunday, a local official reported a second death, telling the Unian news agency that a railroad worker was killed and several others were injured in the attacks while servicing rail infrastructure.

Ukrainian air force spokesman Yuriy Ignat said the first air-launched weapons to successfully target the capital since June 5 were Kh-101 cruise missiles fired from warplanes over the Caspian Sea, more than 932 miles away.

Kyiv's mayor told journalists he thought the airstrikes were "maybe a symbolic attack" ahead of a NATO summit in Madrid that starts Tuesday. A former commander of U.S. forces in Europe said the strikes also were a signal to the leaders of G-7 nations meeting Sunday in Germany.

"Russia is saying, 'We can do this all day long. You guys are powerless to stop us,'" said retired Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, the former commanding general of U.S. Army forces in Europe. "The Russians are humiliating the leaders of the West."

Zelenskyy, speaking in his nightly video address, appealed to the G-7 leaders for more help, saying stopping Russian aggression "is possible only if we get everything we ask for, and in the time we need it -- weapons, financial support and sanctions against Russia."

A Ukrainian parliament member, Oleksiy Goncharenko, wrote on the Telegram messaging app that preliminary information indicated that Russia launched 14 missiles toward the capital region and Kyiv itself. Zelenskyy said some were intercepted, and he vowed revenge against "all pilots, dispatchers, technicians and other people who ensure the launch of missiles in Ukraine."


"We will find you all. Each of you will be responsible for these blows," Zelenskyy vowed. "And if someone thinks he will evade responsibility by saying that this was an order, you are wrong. When your missiles hit homes, it's a war crime. The court is what awaits you all. And you will not hide anywhere -- neither on the shores of the Caspian Sea, over which your missiles are launched, nor in Belarus ... Nowhere."

In a phone interview, retired U.S. general Hodges told reporters that Russia has a limited stock of precision missiles and "if they are using them, it's going to be for a special purpose,"

Russia has denied targeting civilians during the 4-month-old war, and Hodges said it was hard to know if the missiles launched Sunday were intended to strike the apartment buildings.

Russian forces tried to seize control of Kyiv early in the war. After Ukrainian troops repelled them, the Kremlin largely shifted its focus to southern and eastern Ukraine.


On the economic front, Russia is poised to default on its foreign debt for the first time since the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, further alienating the country from the global financial system after international sanctions imposed over its war.

The country faced a Sunday night deadline to meet a 30-day grace period on interest payments originally due May 27. But it could take time to confirm a default.

Russia calls any default artificial because it has the money to pay its debts but says sanctions have frozen its foreign currency reserves held abroad.

Russian rocket strikes in the city of Cherkasy, about 100 miles southeast of Kyiv, killed one person and injured five, regional governor Ihor Taburets said Sunday.

In the east, Russian troops fought to consolidate their gains by battling to swallow up the last remaining Ukrainian stronghold in Luhansk province. Luhansk Gov. Serhiy Haidai said Sunday that Russia was conducting intense airstrikes on the city of Lysychansk, destroying its television tower and seriously damaging a road bridge.

"There's very much destruction. Lysychansk is almost unrecognizable," he wrote on Facebook.

For weeks, Lysychansk and the nearby city of Sievierodonetsk have been subject to a destructive offensive by Russian forces and their separatist allies aimed at capturing all of Ukraine's eastern Donbas region.

They have made steady and slow progress, with Haidai confirming Saturday that Sievierodonetsk, including a chemical plant where hundreds of Ukrainian troops and civilians were holed up, had fallen.

Commenting on the battle for Sievierodonetsk, Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said late Saturday that Russian and Moscow-backed separatist forces now control not only the city but the villages surrounding it. He said the Russian military had thwarted Ukrainian forces' attempt to turn the Azot chemical plant into a "stubborn center of resistance."

Capturing Lysychansk would give Russian and separatist forces control of every major settlement in Luhansk. At last report, they controlled about half of Donetsk, the second province in the Donbas.

On Saturday, Russia launched dozens of missiles on several areas across the country far from the heart of the eastern battles. Some of the missiles were fired from Russian long-range Tu-22 bombers deployed from Belarus for the first time, Ukraine's air command said.

Reacting to the shelling from the Russian bombers, Zelenskyy appealed to the people of Belarus to resist cooperation with the Russian military. "The Russian leadership wants to draw you -- all Belarusians -- into the war, wants to sow hatred between us," he said in his video address Sunday. "You can refuse to participate in this war. Your lives belong only to you, not to someone in the Kremlin."

Belarus hosts Russian military units and was used as a staging ground before Russia invaded Ukraine, but its own troops have not crossed the border. In a meeting Saturday, Russian President Vladimir Putin told Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko that Russia planned to supply Belarus with the Iskander-M missile system.

RUSSIAN-SYRIAN DRILLS

Meanwhile, hundreds of Syrian paratroopers took part in a joint drill with their Russian counterparts in the war-torn country in the second joint maneuver this month, state media reported.

The agency did not give further details in its Saturday night report about the drill or say where they took place. It said the aim was to train Syrian paratroopers how to respond in varied circumstances.

Russia is a main backer of President Bashar Assad and has a broad presence in Syria where an 11-year conflict has killed hundreds of thousands and displaced half the country's pre-war population.

Russia became involved militarily in Syria in September 2015 helping to tip the balance of power in favor of Assad's forces.

Earlier this month, the Syrian and Russian air forces conducted drills over different parts of the country, including on the edge of the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

Four months ago, the two countries conducted a drill a week before Russia began its invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24. In mid-February, the Russian military deployed long-range nuclear-capable bombers and fighter jets carrying state-of-the-art hypersonic missiles to Syria for massive naval drills in the Mediterranean Sea.

Information for this article was contributed by Oleksandr Stashevskyi and staff members of The Associated Press.

  photo  Servicemen work at the scene at a residential building following explosions, in Kyiv, Ukraine, Sunday, June 26, 2022. Several explosions rocked the west of the Ukrainian capital in the early hours of Sunday morning, with at least two residential buildings struck, according to Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)
 
 
  photo  Damage at the scene of a residential building following explosions, in Kyiv, Ukraine, Sunday, June 26, 2022. Several explosions rocked the west of the Ukrainian capital in the early hours of Sunday morning, with at least two residential buildings struck, according to Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)
 
 
  photo  Firefighters work at the scene of a residential building following explosions, in Kyiv, Ukraine, Sunday, June 26, 2022. Several explosions rocked the west of the Ukrainian capital in the early hours of Sunday morning, with at least two residential buildings struck, according to Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)
 
 
  photo  Ukrainian soldier Artem looks on during an interview to the Associated Press in Bakhmut, Donetsk region, Ukraine, Sunday , June 26, 2022.(AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)
 
 
  photo  A local resident holds the wall clock that stopped when the Russian shelling damaged his house in Bakhmut, Donetsk region, Ukraine, Sunday, June 26, 2022.(AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)
 
 
  photo  A man inspects his house damaged by the Russian shelling in Bakhmut, Donetsk region, Ukraine, Sunday , June 26, 2022.(AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)
 
 
  photo  Ukrainian soldier Volodymyr speaks during an interview with The Associated Press in Bakhmut, Donetsk region, Ukraine, Sunday, June 26, 2022. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)
 
 
  photo  A woman injured when her house was damaged by the Russian shelling sits shocked in the yard of her house in Bakhmut, Donetsk region, Ukraine, Sunday, June 26, 2022.(AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)
 
 
  photo  Ukrainian soldiers enjoy a short rest in Bakhmut, Donetsk region, Ukraine, Sunday, June 26, 2022. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)
 
 



 Gallery: Images from Ukraine, month 5



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