KYIV — Russia launched one of its largest barrages of drones and missiles on Ukraine, killing more than a dozen and wounding scores across the country, Ukrainian officials said on Thursday. At least 16 people, including a child, were killed and 118 wounded across the country as Russian strikes damaged buildings and sparked fires, according to local authorities and the State Emergency Service of Ukraine. Russia launched 659 drones and 44 missiles in the 24 hours before Thursday morning, the Ukrainian Air Force said, in waves of attacks on major cities including the capital Kyiv, Kharkiv, Odesa, Dnipro and Zaporizhzhia. “Over the past day and night, Russia carried out a massive terrorist attack against Ukraine with almost 700 drones, dozens of ballistic and cruise missiles. The attack primarily targeted civilians,” Andrii Sybiha, Ukrainian Foreign Minister said in a post on X Thursday. Strikes on the capital Kyiv killed at least four people, including a 12-year-old, the state emergency service of Ukraine said, while another two people died in the central city of Dnipro, according to Oleksandr Ganzha, the head of the regional administration. Ganzha said earlier that the attack had wounded 10 people, including a 40-year-old woman who had been taken to hospital “in a serious condition”. It was not immediately clear if the woman was the person reported dead. Rescuers in Kyiv pulled a child from the rubble of a residential building that collapsed in the Podilsky district, said the mayor of Kyiv, Vitali Klitschko. At least 48 people were wounded in the incident, emergency services said.A blaze broke out at a building in the capital’s Obolonsky district where missile debris fell and cars caught fire, Klitschko said. The CEO of a construction company in Kyiv said a strike was so close that it “effectively detonated right next to the construction site” of a residential complex, injuring six workers including two in a serious condition who are undergoing surgery. At least eight people were killed in Odesa, where video posted by the State Emergency Service, shows a fire engulfing a building and response teams carrying one casualty on a stretcher. An administrative leader at the Odesa National Music Academy, a higher education music academy in the city, said that one of the halls in a dormitory was badly damaged. “In the middle of the night, all students were evacuated to the academy’s premises; unfortunately, five students were injured and have received medical treatment in the city’s hospitals,” she wrote on Facebook, alongside images of the damaged sleeping quarters strewn with debris and shattered glass. Three people were killed and 34 wounded in attacks on Dnipro in central Ukraine, and at least one person was killed in Zaporizhzhia, in the southeast, according to local authorities and the State Emergency Service. “Such attacks cannot be normalized. These are war crimes that must be stopped and their perpetrators held to account,” Sybiha said. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that the attack caused fatalities in Odesa, Kyiv, and Dnipro as he condemned Russia as “betting on war.” “Another night has proven that Russia does not deserve any easing of global policy or lifting of sanctions,” he said. Zelensky has been in Rome this week, where he held talks with Italy’s leaders. In a statement shared on X, Zelensky said he briefed Italian President Sergio Mattarella on the security cooperation agreements Ukraine has reached with countries in the region, and discussed defense cooperation with Italy’s Minister of Defense Guido Crosetto. The attacks follow a short-lived truce last week after Russian President Vladimir Putin declared a 32-hour ceasefire with Ukraine for the Orthodox Easter holiday, following an earlier offer from Zelensky for a pause in hostilities. — Agencies
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