One of these missiles was an Orechnik, a Russian hypersonic ballistic missile with an intermediate range and capable of carrying nuclear warheads, said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
“Three Russian missiles hit a water supply infrastructure, a market burned, dozens of residential buildings damaged, several ordinary schools, and he (Vladimir Putin, editor’s note) launched his ‘Orechnik’ against Bila Tserkva. They are really crazy,” he declared.
The Russian Defense Ministry indicated in a press release that it had used several of these Orechnik missiles, which kyiv has not yet confirmed, affirming that these “massive strikes” are a response to those of Ukraine on its territory and that they only targeted targets linked to the Ukrainian army.
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“Chaos total”
“The greatest destruction took place in kyiv”, “the main target of the Russian attack”, affirmed Mr. Zelensky, who demanded “decisions” from the Western allies to push Russia towards a resolution of the conflict, the worst in Europe since the Second World War.
AFP journalists in kyiv heard several series of explosions that shook buildings, saw tracer bullets splitting the sky and heard machine gun fire apparently trying to bring down a drone above the city center. Streets are covered in debris, residential buildings heavily damaged, a shopping center completely burned.
According to the mayor of the capital, Vitali Klitschko, two people died in these strikes. A school was hit in the Shevchenkivsky district, and a strike “near” another school resulted in the blockage, with debris, of the entrance to a shelter where residents were taking refuge. The head of the military administration of the city, Tymour Tkatchenko, reported at least 62 injured, including two children, while emergency services battled fires.
“It was total chaos. Children started screaming, people were panicking,” said Sofia Melnychenko, a resident of the town: “It was a truly terrifying night.”
Several cultural buildings, including the Chernobyl Museum, the National Art Museum and the Kyiv Opera House suffered damage, and the Foreign Ministry building was “slightly damaged”. damaged by an explosion nearby,” indicated the head of diplomacy Andriï Sybiga.
Russian bombings also left two dead and nine injured in the kyiv region, at least seven injured in Dnipropetrovsk (center-east), eleven in Cherkassy, and twelve in Kharkiv (north-east), according to regional authorities.
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Caution
President Volodymyr Zelensky had warned the day before against preparations for a massive strike with possible use of the Orechnik missile.
The US embassy in kyiv had also “received information regarding a potentially significant air attack that could occur at any time”.
Moscow has already used the Orechnik twice since the start of its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022: in November 2024 against a military factory, and in January 2026 against an aircraft factory in western Ukraine, near the NATO borders. In both cases, the missiles were not loaded with nuclear warheads.
He deployed it last year in Belarus. This country, an ally of Moscow, borders three member states of the Atlantic Alliance and the European Union – Poland, Lithuania and Latvia – as well as Ukraine.
The Russian president had promised a military response after a Ukrainian drone strike in the night from Thursday to Friday on educational buildings in Starobilsk, in the Ukrainian region of Lugansk (east) occupied by Moscow, which left 21 dead and more than 40 injured.
kyiv denied targeting civilian targets and claimed to have struck a Russian drone unit stationed in the region.
