Two dead and at least 17 injured as Russia and Ukraine attack power infrastructure | Russia

Two people have been killed and at least 17 injured as Russia and Ukraine continue to exchange strikes on each other’s electricity infrastructure, following the breakdown of the short-lived “energy ceasefire” unilaterally declared by Donald Trump.

One person was killed and 15 others injured overnight after Ukraine used more than 1,000 drones to target Russian oil depots, logistics facilities and data centers in one of the largest aerial bombardments ever.

St. Petersburg Governor Alexander Beglov said Sunday that fires broke out overnight at the city’s oil terminal, an oil depot and industrial warehouses. A logistics center owned by Russian retailer Ozon and a data center of local technology company VK were also targeted, the two companies confirmed.

Alexander Drozdenko, governor of the Leningrad region surrounding St. Petersburg, said 145 drones were shot down and about 20,000 people were left without power after the raid. “A large-scale (unmanned aerial vehicle) attack continues to be repelled,” he wrote on Telegram.

Separately, local officials in Zaporizhzhia in southern Ukraine said Russian strikes killed a woman and injured at least two other people, including a six-year-old girl. Two apartment buildings, 18 cars and an educational institution were damaged in the attack, according to Mykhailo Semikin, head of the Zaporizhzhia regional military administration.

Tensions are escalating between kyiv and Washington, with the US president criticizing Ukraine for its strikes on Russian oil infrastructure, despite continued Russian aggression.

Trump announced an “energy ceasefire” last week – which neither side said they had agreed to beforehand – which quickly failed as Moscow continued its strikes on Ukraine’s power grid and kyiv eventually resumed strikes on Russian oil refineries.

The Russian Defense Ministry said its air defense units shot down 1,015 Ukrainian drones across the country overnight. The Tass news agency cited Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov as saying Russia was responding with systematic and large-scale strikes.

“The kyiv regime is resisting, but this cannot change the course of events,” he said, responding to a question about how Russia might react to kyiv’s attack on St. Petersburg.

On Saturday, Russia announced it had carried out a major attack overnight, targeting Ukraine’s largest steel mill in the town of Kryvy Rih and ships using the port of Odessa. In a statement, the Russian Defense Ministry said its forces also struck an electricity substation in the northwestern city of Zhytomyr and another steel plant in Zaporizhzhia.

In the Trump administration’s latest effort to reduce tensions with Russia, the US president announced Friday that he would suspend a sweeping new sanctions package targeting the Russian economy, telling Congress that the pause on legislation passed by both chambers was in the national interest.

Trump has not yet given details of his decision regarding new sanctions against Russia.

“We’ll find out, and you’ll find out,” he told reporters at a fundraising dinner at his Florida estate on Saturday. “But it’s a very good decision, and it will be a decision that is good for the country, and I think good for the world.”

In an article on X on Sunday, Zelenskyy said that in the week after Trump announced an energy ceasefire, Russia had attacked Ukraine’s energy, oil and gas sectors 76 times.

He also said that just the night before, energy facilities in four Ukrainian regions had been attacked and tens of thousands of families were still without electricity. He accused Russia of trying to cause a blackout.

“America must understand that Russia is not taking any reciprocal action in response to sanctions relief or agreements,” he said. “Rather, they take every signal of opportunity to make money as proof that their gamble on war is paying off and that they can continue to fight. »

Zelensky also stressed that the war was continuing because of the Russian invasion – not because Ukraine was defending itself. “It is Russia that has to face pressure for peace to have a chance. Thanks to everyone who understands this and helps,” he said.

Fears that the conflict could spill over to NATO’s borders were stoked again on Sunday morning after Lithuania asked residents in the central and northern parts of the country to take shelter for about an hour after an unidentified flying object entered its airspace.

During the red alert, NATO fighter jets were dispatched to the area and Kaunas airport, near Lithuania’s second-largest city, was temporarily closed, the national crisis management center said.

NATO planes were unable to visually identify the object due to cloudy weather and did not attempt to shoot it down, the center said.

Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry later said it regretted the possible diversion of its drones into Lithuanian airspace on Sunday, which it said may have been caused by Russian electronic warfare.

“We apologize for any disruption, risk and worry this may have caused,” a spokesperson, Heorhii Tykhyi, wrote on X. “We are committed to sharing all relevant information with our Lithuanian partners to establish the full circumstances of the “incident.”

Ukrainian drones have repeatedly entered NATO airspace in the Baltic region in recent months. Kyiv said they were diverted from course because of jamming of Russian signals. Such incidents have fueled fears of an extension of Russia’s war into Ukraine.

Reuters, Associated Press and Agence France-Presse contributed to this report