Russia’s biggest strike on Kyiv in weeks kills at least eight

Russia’s overnight missile-and-drone barrage on Kyiv killed at least eight people, injured 34 and trapped some residents inside shattered apartment blocks after a direct hit on a residential building. The attack, among the biggest on the Ukrainian capital in weeks, came hours after Volodymyr Zelensky warned that Moscow was preparing a massive strike and cut short a visit to Dublin.

The assault hit residential buildings across the city and sparked a fire in a hotel on a central boulevard. Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said the first through sixth floors of one apartment building collapsed after a direct hit, while Kyiv City Military Administration head Tymur Tkachenko said about three dozen locations were damaged. Firefighters and emergency crews worked through rubble as dawn broke, and people sheltered in metro stations while the bombardment continued.

The scale and timing pointed to more than routine pressure on the city. By mixing ballistic and cruise missiles with drones, Russia again appeared to be trying to saturate Ukraine’s air defenses, raise the cost of interception and keep the capital under constant strain. The targets also carried a political message: residential blocks, a central hotel and public shelter sites all sit deep inside the civilian fabric of Kyiv, far from the front line.

Zelensky’s decision to leave Dublin early underscored how quickly the threat forced itself into Ukraine’s diplomatic schedule. He had been in Ireland for the start of its six-month presidency of the European Union when warnings of an overnight attack prompted the change in plans. The strike landed as Kyiv was already bracing for another round of Russian long-range attacks, after a month in which the capital suffered some of its heaviest bombardment of the war.

Klitschko said the wounded included paramedics and ambulance drivers, and some people were still trapped in damaged residential buildings after the strike. The latest attack added to the pressure on a city that has spent much of the war moving between air-raid alerts, shelter platforms and rescue operations, with each large barrage testing both Ukraine’s defenses and the endurance of its civilians.