Massive Russian strike on Ukraine’s capital kills several people, injures dozens, as peace talks apparently stall

Russia attacked Kyiv with an hours-long barrage of missiles and drones overnight, killing at least eight people and injuring more than 70 in its deadliest assault on the Ukrainian capital since last July. It came as peace talks appeared to stall.

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said after the attack he was cutting short his official trip to South Africa and returning home as Kyiv reeled from the bombardment that kept residents on edge for about 11 hours. Zelenskyy branded the strike as “one of (Russia’s) most outrageous.”

Kyiv Mayor Vitalii Klitschko announced that Friday would be an official day of mourning day in the capital.

The Ukrainian air force said Russia fired 66 ballistic and cruise missiles, four plane-launched air-to-surface missiles, and 145 Shahed and decoy drones at Kyiv and four other regions of Ukraine.

Rescue workers with flashlights scoured the charred rubble of partly collapsed homes as the blue lights of emergency vehicles lit up the dark city streets.

The attack, which began around 1 a.m., hit at least five neighborhoods in Kyiv.

Russia claimed it was targeting Ukraine’s defense industry, including plants that produced “rocket fuel and gunpowder” in the strikes, French news agency AFP reported.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko told Reuters eight people had been confirmed killed in the capital. Officials had said earlier that nine were killed.  

The attack came as weeks of peace negotiations appeared to be culminating without an agreement in sight and hours after President Trump lashed out at Zelenskyy, accusing him of prolonging the “killing field” by refusing to surrender the Russia-occupied Crimea Peninsula as part of a possible deal even though, he said, Crimea had been “lost years ago.”

“This completely corresponds with our understanding, which we have been saying for a long time,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters Thursday, according to AFP.

Zelenskyy has repeated many times during the more than three-year war that recognizing occupied territory as Russian is a red line for his country. He noted Thursday that Ukraine had agreed to a U.S. ceasefire proposal 44 days ago, as a first step to a negotiated peace, but that Russia’s attacks had continued.

He said in South Africa that the latest attack meant the future of negotiations “depends on Russia’s intention because it is in Moscow where they have to make a decision.”

While talks have been going on in recent weeks, Russia has hit the city of Sumy, killing more than 30 civilians gathered to celebrate Palm Sunday, battered Odesa with drones and blasted Zaporizhzhia with powerful glide bombs.

The European Union’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, said the latest attack underscored that the main obstacle to ending the war is Russia.

“While claiming to seek peace, Russia launched a deadly airstrike on Kyiv,” she wrote on social media. “This isn’t a pursuit of peace, it’s a mockery of it.”

Senior U.S. officials have warned that the Trump administration could soon give up its efforts to stop the war if the two sides don’t compromise.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said the attack showed Russian President Vladimir Putin is determined to press his bigger army’s advantage on the roughly 620-mile front line, where it currently holds the momentum.

“Putin demonstrates through his actions, not words, that he does not respect any peace efforts and only wants to continue the war,” Sybiha said on X. “Weakness and concessions will not stop his terror and aggression. Only strength and pressure will.”

According to the Reuters news agency, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova asserted Thursday that Zelenskyy was refusing to make any concessions in the peace talks and would only agree to a ceasefire on his own terms.   

Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal noted that since Russia’s February 2022 full-scale invasion of its neighbor, Russian attacks have killed some 13,000 civilians, including 618 children.

At a Kyiv residential building that was almost entirely destroyed Thursday, emergency workers removed rubble with their hands, rescuing a trapped woman who emerged from the wreckage covered in white dust and moaning in pain.

An elderly woman sat against a brick wall, face smeared with blood, her eyes fixed to the ground in shock as medics tended to her wounds.

Fires were reported in several residential buildings said Tymur Tkachenko, the head of the city military administration.

Oksana Bilozir, a student, suffered a head injury in the attack. With blood seeping from her bandaged head, she said that she heard a loud explosion after the air alarm blared and began to grab her things to flee to a shelter when another blast caused her home’s walls to crumble and the lights to go off.

“I honestly don’t even know how this will all end, it’s very scary,” said Bilozir, referring to the war against Russia’s invasion. “I only believe that if we can stop them on the battlefield, then that’s it. No diplomacy works here.”

The attack kept many people awake all night long as multiple loud explosions reverberated around the city and flashes of light punctuated the sky. Families gathered in public air raid shelters, some of them bringing their pets.

Anastasiia Zhuravlova, 33, a mother of two, was sheltering in a basement after multiple blasts damaged her home. Her family was sleeping when the first explosion shattered their windows and sent kitchen appliances flying in the air. Shards of glass rained down on them as they rushed to take cover in the corridor.

“After that we came to the shelter because it was scary and dangerous at home,” she said.