Ukrainian officials said at least three people were killed in overnight Russian strikes that targeted residential buildings in the eastern city of Kramatorsk.
The February 8 attacks included heavy “glide” bombs, officials said, weapons that Russia has used to devastate both Ukrainian frontline positions as well as residential areas.
Nearly 20 people were injured in the early morning attacks, the National Police said.
In total, Russia fired more than 400 drones and missile at locations across the country, President Volodymy Zelenskyy said. In a post to Telegram, he complained that the Russian weapons continued to be equipped with imported foreign parts and components, as he announced new measures aimed at cutting off supplies of the parts.
Along with Slovyansk, Kramatorsk is one of two major cities that Ukraine still controls in the eastern Donetsk region. The two are considered “stronghold cities” that are essential to Ukraine’s defenses in the region.
Russia has made capturing the entire Donetsk region a strategic priority, a point it has hammered home repeatedly in ongoing peace negotiations brokered by the United States.
Throughout this winter, Russia has relentlessly targeted civilian residences across Ukraine, as well as the country’s power grid and heating facilities. Millions of people in the capital, Kyiv, and other cities have struggled with electricity or heating outages as unusually bitter cold has gripped the country for weeks.
State-run oil-and-gas company Naftogaz said that Russia targeted its facilities in the eastern Poltava region overnight.
“This attack was the 19th targeted Russian attack on the [Nafogaz] facilities since the beginning of the year,” the company said.
Other locations across Ukraine were also hit by aerial attacks overnight on February 8, including the port cities of Kherson and Odesa.
The government ordered emergency nationwide power shutdowns on February 7, after earlier Russian strikes, which also hit electricity generation and distribution facilities.
This past week, Kyiv and Moscow concluded two days of US-brokered talks in Abu Dhabi. There were no major breakthroughs, however, another signal of how difficult efforts to end the nearly four-year-old war are.
Ukrainian and Russian negotiators are reportedly set to meet for a new round of talks in the coming week in the United States.
