Russia pounded Ukrainian cities with missiles and drones on Tuesday, killing at least 10 civilians as Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky said that every step Vladimir Putin is taking points towards escalation.
Zelensky said that Russian forces had used ballistic missiles supplied by North Korea in a devastating overnight attack in Zaporizhzhia, where a company said seven workers at a steel plant were killed and 21 injured. He emphasized that every step Russia takes — increasing ballistic missile production, bringing in North Korean equipment, preparing for mobilization — all of this shows that Moscow is preparing not for peace, but for escalation.
Three more people, including a 15-year-old boy, were killed by Russian drones and artillery in the central Dnipropetrovsk region, authorities said, amid growing frustration over a lack of vital air defences.
Russian forces also struck parts of Kyiv, including the grounds of a children’s hospital, leaving two craters and shattering windows, emergency services said. Children and medical staff were in shelters and nobody was hurt.
The Russian defense ministry said its forces overnight struck military industrial facilities and transport and logistics centers in Kyiv and Zaporizhzhia with ground-based precision weapons.
Ukraine says that Russia is scaling up its production of ballistic missiles to exploit Kyiv’s critical shortage of air defense interceptors, and claims Moscow is preparing to recruit more troops for a new push on the front line.
Meanwhile, Zelensky said on Tuesday that Ukraine had turned over proposals to US negotiators for a plan to end the more than four-year-old war with Russia. He told the nation in his nightly address on Tuesday: We have conveyed our proposals to the American side.
And the United States can help strengthen our defence, first and foremost with air defence, and put pressure on Russia so that its plans are different — to prepare for an end to the war rather than prolonging it, he said.
