Ukraine says 'massive' Russian missile attack targeted energy infrastructure

By Burc Eruygur

ISTANBUL (AA) - Ukraine said on Thursday that a "massive" Russian missile attack targeted the country's energy infrastructure.

“The energy sector is once again under massive attack by the enemy. Strikes on energy facilities are happening across Ukraine,” Energy Minister Herman Halushchenko said in a statement on Facebook.

Expressing that the country’s power grid operator Ukrenergo implemented emergency power cuts, Halushchenko said the extent of the damage inflicted will be assessed once the security situation allows it.

Serhiy Popko, the head of the Kyiv City Military Administration, said on Telegram that fragments from downed missiles fell on the territory of an enterprise in the capital’s Darnytskyi district, damaging several outbuildings.

In Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, Governor Oleh Synyehubov said on Telegram that a civilian enterprise was damaged due to the attack.

Power outages were also reported by local authorities across multiple regions of Ukraine, including Lviv, Rivne, and Volyn.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian private energy provider DTEK said the power cuts implemented by Ukrenergo have affected Kyiv, as well as the Odesa, Dnipropetrovsk, and Donetsk regions.

Elsewhere, Ukraine’s national railway company Ukrzaliznytsia said that more than 150 of its trains are running on schedule despite the missile strikes, which it said resulted in power cuts in certain sections of the country’s railway system.

Russian authorities have not yet commented on the attack.