MOSCOW — Russian military officials announced Tuesday that their extensive nighttime bombardment of Ukraine served as retaliation for what they characterized as “terrorist acts” by Ukrainian forces, claiming they successfully hit numerous Ukrainian military installations.
Officials in Ukraine reported that Russian aerial weapons and missiles hammered the capital city and additional locations during the early morning hours Tuesday, resulting in no fewer than 11 deaths and over 100 injuries after several days of alerts regarding Moscow’s preparations for a large-scale offensive.
“Overnight, in response to terrorist acts of the Kyiv regime, the armed forces of the Russian Federation carried out a massive strike using high-precision long-range air-, land-, and sea-based weapons,” the Russian Defence Ministry said in a statement.
According to Russian officials, the military deployed advanced hypersonic weapons and unmanned aircraft to strike seven regions across Ukraine, including Kyiv, Zaporizhzhia, and Kharkiv, claiming successful hits on locations valuable to Ukrainian military operations including energy infrastructure, transportation hubs, and aviation facilities.
Moscow issued a warning the previous week that it would begin conducting “systematic strikes” against targets in Kyiv as payback for what it described as a catastrophic Ukrainian drone assault on student housing in Russian-controlled Luhansk in eastern Ukraine, resulting in 21 fatalities.
Ukrainian officials maintained they had aimed at a drone operations center in that area rather than students. Putin stated Monday night that Kyiv had “opened a new page in a series of crimes” through the dormitory attack and a subsequent strike on residential buildings in a Russian-controlled section of Ukraine’s Kherson region. Each side rejects accusations of intentionally attacking non-combatants.
