Russia launched a wave of drone and missile attacks on Ukraine overnight Friday, killing at least three people and severely damaging major energy facilities in three areas, Ukrainian officials said, Reuters reported.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced that Russia had launched more than 450 drones and 45 missiles.
Two people were killed and 12 injured in the city of Dnipro when a drone hit an apartment building. Another person was killed in the Kharkiv region, local officials said.
According to Prime Minister Yulia Sviridenko, energy facilities in the Kyiv, Poltava and Kharkiv regions were damaged.
Zelensky calls for stronger sanctions pressure
Zelensky said that the attacks show the need to strengthen sanctions against Russia.
"...for every Moscow attack on energy infrastructure, aimed at harming ordinary people before winter, there must be a response through sanctions that will hit the entire Russian energy sector, without exception," he wrote on the Telegram app.
Since the start of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine nearly four years ago, Russia has regularly attacked the energy sector, especially ahead of the heating season. This fall, Russian forces attacked gas facilities nine times in two months, according to state energy company Naftogaz.
The Russian Defense Ministry announced that it had carried out a "massive strike with high-precision, long-range weapons from the air, land and sea" on production and energy facilities in response to Ukrainian attacks on Russian territory.
Moscow also said its forces were continuing to advance in fierce fighting around the key towns of Pokrovsk and Kupyansk, and had captured a small village in eastern Ukraine.
Ukraine regularly uses its drones to attack Russian oil facilities.
As diplomatic efforts to end the war fail, Kiev is trying to reduce Moscow's ability to finance the war.
The Ukrainian Air Force said it shot down 406 Russian drones and nine missiles, while 26 missiles and 52 drones hit a total of 25 targets.
Sviridenko said the government and energy companies are working to restore electricity, water and heating supplies.
In the central Poltava region, two cities — Kremenchuk (population about 200.000) and Gorishin Plavny (population about 50.000) — have lost most of their electricity and are now using generators to provide water supplies, city officials said.
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