Russia carried out a sweeping assault on Ukraine‘s Zaporizhzhia that killed one person, left at least 24 others injured, and caused damage to both infrastructure and residential buildings, authorities reported on Saturday.
Three children were among the 24 wounded in the southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia, its Regional Governor, Ivan Fedorov, said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy reported impacts on 14 regions by the attack, which used over 500 drones and 45 missiles.
Diplomatic efforts to end Russia’s full-scale invasion have so far yielded little, even after U.S. President Donald Trump met separately with Russian and Ukrainian leaders earlier this month.
On Friday, Zelenskyy brought up Trump’s self-imposed deadline for deciding on new measures against Russia if President Vladimir Putin fails to commit to a one-on-one meeting with the Ukrainian leader.
“Two weeks will be on Monday. And we will remind everybody,” he said.
Russia has said there is no agenda for a potential summit between Putin and Zelenskyy.
“It is absolutely clear that Moscow used the time meant for preparing a leaders-level meeting to organise new massive attacks,” Zelenskyy said on Saturday, calling for sanctions on Russian banking and energy sectors.
The air force recorded five missiles and 24 drone hits at 7 locations with debris falling on 21 sites, according to the statement on the Telegram messaging app.
The attack on Zaporizhzhia cut power to 25,000 residents, Fedorov said. The local energy facility said the attack damaged its equipment and that repairs were underway.
As of early Saturday, Ukrainian state-owned railway Ukrzaliznytsia said it had repaired the damage to its infrastructure in the Kyiv region.
Zelenskyy’s Security Guarantee Push
Zelenskyy on Friday called on Ukraine’s allies to quickly move discussions on security guarantees to direct talks between national leaders. His appeal came as European Union defence ministers said they would be ready to train Ukrainian forces inside the country if a truce is reached.
Kyiv is engaged in a diplomatic push to try and bring to an end Russia’s war, now in its fourth year, and to secure critical commitments from its partners to fend off any future invasion.
The Ukrainian president said he expected to continue talks with European leaders next week on “NATO-like” commitments to protect Ukraine, adding that U.S. President Donald Trump should also be involved.
“We need the architecture to be clear to everyone,” he said, adding that he wanted to tell Trump “how we see it”.
Zelenskyy spoke shortly before his chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, met U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff in New York to discuss the need to increase pressure on Moscow.
(With inputs from Reuters)
