ODESA, Ukraine: Russia pounded Ukraine’s Black Sea city of Odesa late on Thursday with one of its biggest drone attacks, injuring three teenagers and sparking fires as the Czech president visited, Ukrainian officials said.
The attack comes as the United States is pushing for a peace deal between Ukraine and Russia, and hoping to agree a partial ceasefire that would halt strikes on energy infrastructure by both sides.
Czech President Petr Pavel, a vocal backer of Kyiv who has led an effort to source more than one million artillery shells for Ukraine’s war effort, was in the port city for talks with regional officials at the time of the strikes.
“Significantly, it was during our meeting that the enemy once again massively attacked the Odesa region,” Governor Oleh Kiper said on the Telegram messaging app.
The long-range drones buzzed into the city in several waves, damaging infrastructure, residential houses and commercial buildings, and causing multiple fires, the interior ministry said.
Around 25 cars had been set ablaze at a car repair shop.
“We could not do anything. We were just standing and watching as everything was on fire. I am in total shock,” the shop’s owner, who gave her name as Inna, said.
Oleksandr Kovalenko, a military analyst, said that Russia used new tactics for the attack, having its drones descend from a higher altitude than usual and at high speeds to make it harder for Ukraine’s air defenses.
He said it was one of the “most massive” attacks on Odesa since Russia invaded in February 2022: “It was intimidation. Terror against the civilian population.”
Separately on Friday, Russia and Ukraine accused each other of attacking a major Russian gas pumping and measuring station that lies in a part of Russia’s Kursk region that Moscow’s forces recaptured from Ukraine earlier this month.
Moscow said Ukraine had blown up the facility in an act of terrorism. Kyiv said Russian forces shelled it with artillery in “a provocation” and denied any involvement.
Both Russia and Ukraine have agreed during separate talks with US officials that they are ready for a moratorium on strikes on energy infrastructure. Moscow rejected a more comprehensive 30-day ceasefire.
Ukrainian, US and Russian delegations are due to meet in Saudi Arabia separately on Monday to discuss the details, officials have said.
Russia launched a total of 214 drones at Ukraine overnight, the air force said. It did not specify how many drones targeted Odesa. The air force said it shot down 114 of the drones and that another 81 drones were “lost,” its term for those suppressed using electronic warfare defenses.
Ukraine has used drones to continue striking targets in Russia, hitting oil infrastructure and a strategic bomber base in recent days.
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Russian drones hammer Ukraine’s Odesa as Czech leader visits
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Russian drones hammer Ukraine’s Odesa as Czech leader visits
- The attack comes as the US is pushing for a peace deal between Ukraine and Russia
- Ukrainian, US and Russian delegations are due to meet in Saudi Arabia separately on Monday
Russia puts death toll from Ukrainian strike on occupied village at 27. Kyiv rejects accusation
Russian authorities said Friday that the death toll from a Ukrainian drone strike they said struck a café in a Russian-occupied village in Ukraine’s Kherson region rose to 27 people. Kyiv denied attacking civilian targets.
Svetlana Petrenko, spokeswoman of Russia’s main criminal investigation agency, the Investigative Committee, said in a statement that a Ukrainian drone strike on a café and hotel in the village of Khorly, where at least 100 civilians were celebrating New Year’s Eve overnight into Thursday, killed 27 people, including two minors. A total of 31, including five minors, were hospitalized with injuries.
A criminal probe on the charges of carrying out an act of terrorism has been opened, Petrenko said.
Kyiv denied attacking civilians. Spokesman of Ukraine’s General Staff, Dmytro Lykhovii, told Ukraine’s public broadcaster Suspilne on Thursday that Ukrainian forces “adhere to the norms of international humanitarian law” and “carry out strikes exclusively against Russian military targets, facilities of the Russian fuel and energy sector, and other lawful targets.”
Lykhovii said that General Staff has published an explicit list of targets that the Ukrainian army struck on the night of New Year’s Eve. The list did not include strikes on occupied parts of the Kherson region.
Lykhovii noted that Russia has repeatedly used disinformation and false statements to disrupt the ongoing peace negotiations.
The Associated Press could not independently verify claims made about the attack.
Russia’s accusations against Ukraine come amid a US-led diplomatic push to end the nearly four-year war in Ukraine. Earlier this week, Moscow alleged that Kyiv launched a long-range drone attack against a residence of Russian President Vladimir Putin in northwestern Russia overnight from Sunday to Monday.
Kyiv has called the allegations of an attack on Putin’s residence a ruse to derail ongoing peace negotiations, which have ramped up in recent weeks on both sides of the Atlantic.
In his New Year’s address, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that a peace deal was “90 percent ready” but warned that the remaining 10 percent, believed to include key sticking points such as territory, would “determine the fate of peace, the fate of Ukraine and Europe, how people will live.”
Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff said Wednesday that he, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Trump’s son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner had a “productive call” with the national security advisers of Britain, France, Germany and Ukraine “to discuss advancing the next steps in the European peace process.”
Elsewhere in Ukraine, Russia conducted what local authorities called “one of the most massive” drone attacks at Zaporizhzhia overnight.
At least nine Russian drones struck the city, damaging dozens of residential buildings and other civilian infrastructure, head of the regional administration, Ivan Fedorov, wrote on Telegram on Friday. There were no casualties, the official said.
Overall, Russia fired 116 long-range drones at Ukraine last night, according to Ukraine’s Air Force, which said that 86 drones were intercepted, while 27 more have reached their targets.
The Russian Defense Ministry reported Friday that its air defenses intercepted 64 Ukrainian drones overnight over multiple Russian regions.
Vyacheslav Gladkov, governor of Russia’s Belgorod region on the border with Ukraine, on Friday also accused Ukrainian forces of carrying out a missile strike on the city of Belgorod. Two women were hospitalized with injuries, Gladkov said. The strike shattered windows in multiple residential buildings and damaged an unspecified “commercial” facility and a number of cars, according to the official.
Svetlana Petrenko, spokeswoman of Russia’s main criminal investigation agency, the Investigative Committee, said in a statement that a Ukrainian drone strike on a café and hotel in the village of Khorly, where at least 100 civilians were celebrating New Year’s Eve overnight into Thursday, killed 27 people, including two minors. A total of 31, including five minors, were hospitalized with injuries.
A criminal probe on the charges of carrying out an act of terrorism has been opened, Petrenko said.
Kyiv denied attacking civilians. Spokesman of Ukraine’s General Staff, Dmytro Lykhovii, told Ukraine’s public broadcaster Suspilne on Thursday that Ukrainian forces “adhere to the norms of international humanitarian law” and “carry out strikes exclusively against Russian military targets, facilities of the Russian fuel and energy sector, and other lawful targets.”
Lykhovii said that General Staff has published an explicit list of targets that the Ukrainian army struck on the night of New Year’s Eve. The list did not include strikes on occupied parts of the Kherson region.
Lykhovii noted that Russia has repeatedly used disinformation and false statements to disrupt the ongoing peace negotiations.
The Associated Press could not independently verify claims made about the attack.
Russia’s accusations against Ukraine come amid a US-led diplomatic push to end the nearly four-year war in Ukraine. Earlier this week, Moscow alleged that Kyiv launched a long-range drone attack against a residence of Russian President Vladimir Putin in northwestern Russia overnight from Sunday to Monday.
Kyiv has called the allegations of an attack on Putin’s residence a ruse to derail ongoing peace negotiations, which have ramped up in recent weeks on both sides of the Atlantic.
In his New Year’s address, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that a peace deal was “90 percent ready” but warned that the remaining 10 percent, believed to include key sticking points such as territory, would “determine the fate of peace, the fate of Ukraine and Europe, how people will live.”
Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff said Wednesday that he, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Trump’s son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner had a “productive call” with the national security advisers of Britain, France, Germany and Ukraine “to discuss advancing the next steps in the European peace process.”
Elsewhere in Ukraine, Russia conducted what local authorities called “one of the most massive” drone attacks at Zaporizhzhia overnight.
At least nine Russian drones struck the city, damaging dozens of residential buildings and other civilian infrastructure, head of the regional administration, Ivan Fedorov, wrote on Telegram on Friday. There were no casualties, the official said.
Overall, Russia fired 116 long-range drones at Ukraine last night, according to Ukraine’s Air Force, which said that 86 drones were intercepted, while 27 more have reached their targets.
The Russian Defense Ministry reported Friday that its air defenses intercepted 64 Ukrainian drones overnight over multiple Russian regions.
Vyacheslav Gladkov, governor of Russia’s Belgorod region on the border with Ukraine, on Friday also accused Ukrainian forces of carrying out a missile strike on the city of Belgorod. Two women were hospitalized with injuries, Gladkov said. The strike shattered windows in multiple residential buildings and damaged an unspecified “commercial” facility and a number of cars, according to the official.
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