Rocket attacks hit cities across Ukraine on Tuesday, causing mass power outages, days after a humiliating Russian retreat in the country’s south and in the middle of the G20 summit.
The renewed bombardment, which officials said hit apartment buildings in Kyiv, transcended the days of Ukraine’s jubilation over the retaking of the key city of Kherson.
Lviv to the west and Kharkiv to the east were also attacked on Tuesday, authorities said, but there was no immediate information on possible casualties.
Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko announced the attack after reports that air raid sirens were sounding in all regions of Ukraine, leaving at least half of Kyiv residents without power.
“According to preliminary information, two residential buildings in the Pechersk district were hit,” he said, adding “several missiles were shot down … by air defense systems.
Deputy Head of the President’s Office Kyrylo Tymoshenko said the rockets were fired by Russian forces.
He circulated footage of the apparent scene of the attacks, which showed a fire in a five-story Soviet-era apartment building.
“The danger is not over. Stay in shelters,” he added in the online statement.
The attacks came after Russian-appointed officials in Nova Kakhovka said they were abandoning the key southern city, blaming artillery fire from Kiev forces, which have retaken parts of the south following a Russian withdrawal.
Her announcement comes a day after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited the recently liberated regional capital of the Kherson region and announced “the beginning of the end of the war”.
Zelenskyy said at the G20 summit in Bali on Tuesday that “now is the time” to end the war.
“I am convinced that now is the time when Russia’s war of destruction must and can be stopped,” he said via video link, according to a speech seen by AFP. “It will save thousands of lives.”
Ukrainian forces have been pushing deeper south since September, and Russia last week announced a full withdrawal from the regional capital of the southern region of Kherson, allowing Ukraine entry.
“Employees of the Nova Kakhovka state administration and state and municipal institutions left the city and were transferred to safer places in the region,” the authorities installed in Moscow announced via Telegram.
The Russian-backed officials said after Moscow pulled out of the city of Kherson, Nova Kakhovka came under “indiscriminate fire” and “life in the city is unsafe”.
They also claimed “thousands of residents” followed their recommendation to leave to “save themselves” and said Kiev’s forces were seeking “revenge on collaborators.”
Authorities claimed this did not mean that the city was “abandoned” and that “municipal workers” were working to ensure “the functioning of the energy and water supply systems”.
– Key lady in ‘dangerous’ condition –
Nova Kakhovka lies on the east bank of the Dnipro River, today a natural dividing line between the Ukrainian forces that recaptured the city of Kherson on the west side and the Russian forces on the opposite bank.
It is also home to the Kakhovka hydroelectric power station, which was captured early in the invasion for its strategic importance in supplying the Moscow-annexed Crimean Peninsula.
The Russian-controlled dam is in particular focus now after Zelenskyy accused Russian troops of plotting to blow it up to trigger a devastating flood.
Any problem with the dam would cause water supply problems for Crimea, which has been under Russian control since 2014 and which Ukraine hopes to retake.
Russian forces said last week that a Ukrainian strike had damaged the dam.
The Russian-appointed head of the occupied part of the Kherson region, Vladimir Saldo, said Tuesday the dam was no longer operational.
“Today, the turbines do not produce electricity, and there is no need for that,” he said on state TV channel Rossiya-24, according to Russian authorities.
“The situation is more dangerous – not in terms of power generation – but with the dam itself, which in the event of an explosion would flood a fairly large area.”
The loss of Kherson was the latest in a series of setbacks for the Kremlin, which invaded Ukraine on February 24 in hopes of a blitz takeover that would topple the government in days.
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg nevertheless warned that Ukraine faces difficult months and said Russia’s military capabilities should not be underestimated.
