Ukraine: Kyiv and Lviv region report 'massive' Russian attack
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00:00 Begin in Ukraine, where cities across the country have faced some of the most intense missile strikes
00:05 and nightly drone attacks since the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion.
00:09 The capital Kiev was targeted at dawn this morning, so too Lviv in the west of the country.
00:15 Ukrainian military says most but not all of the missiles were intercepted.
00:20 At the same time, Ukraine's military says it successfully managed to destroy
00:23 two Russian landing ships and hit the main communication centre of Russia's
00:28 Black Sea Fleet in occupied Crimea.
00:30 Let's cross to Kiev. Let's bring in Gulliver Craig, our correspondent.
00:34 Gulliver, tell us first about the Russian strikes and what you heard and saw today.
00:39 Well, myself, I heard a pretty loud explosion around 5am,
00:46 but I think it was the air defence working.
00:48 They say that they shot down all of the 10 missiles that were headed for Kiev
00:52 and there is no damage of any significance reported in the capital.
00:56 Overall, though, according to the Ukrainian air force,
01:00 there were some 29 missiles that were fired and about as many drones.
01:04 They shot down most of the drones and I think 18 out of the 29 missiles.
01:09 So that means quite a significant number of them hit their targets.
01:12 And once again, it seems that the targets were mainly Ukraine's electricity infrastructure.
01:18 It's a sort of second day or second night, rather, if you like,
01:22 of a sustained attempt to do severe damage to the power generation and power distribution capacity,
01:28 which has had terrible effects, particularly in Kharkiv, Ukraine's second city,
01:33 which is heading for now 48 hours of really total blackout.
01:37 And the authorities there say that all of the electricity substations
01:40 have been significantly damaged and they don't know
01:43 when they're going to be able to get the power back on again.
01:45 And in other big cities, there are power cuts as well,
01:47 in particular, Krivirig in the southeast.
01:51 There, they're going to be starting those rolling blackouts to try to stabilize the grid.
01:56 There were also a lot of strikes on the west of the country early this morning.
02:00 I think some more than 10 anyway, that hit Lviv region, actually not Lviv city,
02:06 but an area to the south of there where Naftogaz, Ukraine's state gas company,
02:11 is saying that some of its infrastructure was damaged.
02:16 Russian sources are suggesting that this was a highly strategic installation
02:19 and that the damage is very severe.
02:21 The Ukrainians aren't giving more details on that,
02:24 but certainly a large number of missiles,
02:25 including hypersonic Kinzhal missiles, were used to target this area
02:30 about an hour's drive south of Lviv near the town of Stryi.
02:34 And I think that it's as part of that attack
02:36 that this missile apparently crossed into Polish airspace.
02:39 The Poles are saying this is the third time that this has happened
02:42 since the start of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
02:46 And they've summoned the Russian ambassador for an explanation
02:50 and say that they're going to take steps depending on what he has to say.
02:53 I think now we can play a clip from the Polish defense minister,
02:57 what he had to say about it.
02:58 All the strategic procedures were launched immediately
03:07 and the Polish and NATO F-16 fighters were activated.
03:15 As last night's rocket attack on Ukraine was one of the most intense
03:19 since the beginning of the Russian aggression,
03:21 the object was monitored until it left the Polish airspace.
03:26 It's interesting, Gulliver, talking about, I think,
03:32 the Russian defense ministry today saying that they were targeting
03:35 the energy stations.
03:36 You mentioned Krivy Ry, very interesting as well,
03:38 the former hometown of President Zelensky.
03:41 Meanwhile, what's your understanding of how much damage Ukraine
03:45 has inflicted on the Russian Black Sea fleet?
03:47 Well, I mean, over the course of recent months,
03:52 they've inflicted a huge amount of damage on the Black Sea fleet
03:55 to the extent that they've been able to resume shipping in the Black Sea
03:58 because the Russians don't pose a threat anymore.
04:01 But the latest damage that they are claiming is to have sunk
04:04 two landing ships in the port of Sebastopol
04:07 and also done some damage to a Russian communications station
04:11 in the city of Sebastopol in Crimea.
04:13 There was also an explosion at an oil depot near there.
04:16 Large number of explosions rang out today in Sebastopol.
04:20 Russian sources are saying that civilian homes were also hit
04:24 and that one civilian was killed.
04:26 The Ukrainian campaign of targeting this Russian Black Sea fleet
04:31 has been a source of some pride for them
04:34 and certainly very effective in terms of freeing up the grain shipments.
04:38 But its other purpose is to hamper the Russians' logistics
04:41 in getting troops and supplies to their troops in southern Ukraine,
04:44 Zaporizhia Oblast, Kherson Oblast and the southern part of Donetsk Oblast.
04:49 And in order to get around the problem of the ships
04:52 constantly being destroyed or not being able to be used,
04:54 the Russians have restored the railway going from Rostov-on-Don
04:58 into Ukraine from there,
04:59 which means that the impact of the destruction of these two landing ships,
05:03 if it is confirmed, will be much less than it would have been a few weeks ago
05:06 because the Russians have now got a railway that they can use
05:09 and it's much harder to destroy a railway
05:10 because you can destroy part of it but it can be rebuilt pretty quickly.
05:14 Gulliver, thank you.
05:15 Great context as always.
05:16 Gulliver Crag, our correspondent in Kiev.
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