Shortly after midnight, Swedish time, Russia launched a major missile and drone attack against cities in Ukraine, reports The Kyiv Independent.
The attacks were aimed, among other things, at the Kyiv metropolitan area, where repeated explosions occurred during the night, according to AFP journalists and local authorities.
Several people have been killed in various locations across the country as a result of last night's attacks.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy himself writes on social media about a family from a town near his hometown of Kryvyi Rih who may have been killed when a rocket hit their house.
All ten people – mother and father, seven children and a grandchild – were in the house and six of them have been confirmed dead. The other four have not been found in what remains of the house.
"It was a completely ordinary home, blown to pieces," Zelenskyy writes on Telegram.
The only one in the family who escaped the blast is a son who is in the military.
Many injured
In a later post, Zelenskyy accuses North Korea of supplying Russia with missiles that were used during the night, including the one that hit the house outside Kryvyi Rih.
At least two more people, in Kyiv and Poltava respectively, are reported to have been killed in last night's attacks.
In addition, several explosions were heard in the Ivano-Frankivsk region, among others. In the city of Lviv in western Ukraine, at least 15 people are reported to have been injured, writes AFP.
The attacks came just hours after Zelenskyy warned that Russia was preparing another large-scale attack.
Crashed plane
In Kyiv, the population was urged to take shelter.
“The enemy is attacking the capital with ballistic weapons. The risk of further attacks remains. Stay in the shelters,” Kyiv Mayor Vitaliy Klychko wrote on Telegram.
On Wednesday, a Ukrainian F-16 fighter jet crashed, reports Kyiv Independent.
The cause of the crash is not clear, but according to the Ukrainian military, “an emergency situation” occurred during a mission. The pilot was forced to eject from the plane but survived the incident.
