Man killed in Kyiv as Russia launches large drone attack; Russian ambassador to UK says Moscow has ‘yet to act very seriously’
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Explosions shook the Ukrainian capital in the early hours of Sunday. A 41-year-old man was killed by falling debris of Russian drones being shot out of the air, as the Kremlin launched a 54-strong drone attack on Kyiv.
The death was confirmed by Kyiv’s mayor, Vitali Klitschko, who said a 35-year-old woman was also injured by the fall of the drone’s wreckage in the Solomianskyi district.
Ukraine’s air force said it downed 52 of the 54 drones during the attack, which it said was a “record” attack by the Iranian-made Shaheds.
The Russian ambassador to the UK, Andrei Kelin, told the UK’s BBC that Russia had “enormous resources and we haven’t just started yet to act very seriously”.
In an interview with Laura Kuenssberg, he repeated Russia’s line that the jailed Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich was a “spy”. In response to a question by Vladimir Kara-Murza’s wife, he said it was a decision of the “courts” rather than government-led oppression that led to Kara-Murza’s 25-year jail term.
The death toll from a Russian missile attack on a clinic in Dnipro on Friday rose from two to four people, according to the region’s governor.
South Africa’s president, Cyril Ramaphosa, appointed a panel to investigate US allegations that a Russian ship collected weapons from a naval base near Cape Town last year, the presidency said in a statement on Sunday.
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, asked Ukraine’s parliament to approve 50-year-long sanctions against Iran because of Tehran’s role in supplying Russia with drones and military equipment for the war.
Preliminary operations have begun to pave the way for a counteroffensive against Russian occupying forces, a Ukrainian presidential adviser said. “It’s a complicated process, which is not a matter of one day or a certain date or a certain hour,” Mykhailo Podolyak said in an interview with the Guardian. “It’s an ongoing process of deoccupation, and certain processes are already happening, like destroying supply lines or blowing up depots behind the lines.”
The commander of Ukraine’s armed forces, Gen Valerii Zaluzhnyi, raised expectations that a major operation could be imminent, declaring on social media: “The time has come to take back what’s ours.” Zaluzhnyi’s declaration on the Telegram messaging app on Saturday was accompanied by a cinematic video showing heavily armed Ukrainian soldiers preparing for battle.
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