Russia deployed its Oreshnik hypersonic ballistic missile in a massive overnight strike on Ukraine, killing at least four people and injuring 25 others in Kyiv, Ukrainian authorities said on Friday.
The attack, which lit up the night sky with explosions for several hours, marked only the second known use of the Oreshnik missile by Moscow. The weapon was first deployed in November 2024 during a strike on the central Ukrainian city of Dnipro.
Russia’s defence ministry said the barrage was carried out in retaliation for an alleged Ukrainian drone attack on President Vladimir Putin’s residence in late December, a claim Kyiv has firmly denied. European officials and former US President Donald Trump have also cast doubt on whether such an attack ever occurred.
Although Moscow did not disclose the precise target of the Oreshnik missile, videos circulated on social media shortly before midnight showing multiple explosions on the outskirts of Lviv, a western city located about 60 kilometres from the Polish border. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky later confirmed that a ballistic missile had struck infrastructure in the area.
The Oreshnik is an intermediate-range hypersonic ballistic missile capable of travelling up to 5,500 kilometres. Analysts believe its warhead fragments during the final phase of descent into several independently targeted inert projectiles, producing a series of closely timed explosions.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha described the strike near the European Union and NATO border as a “grave threat” to continental security and a direct challenge to the transatlantic alliance. He dismissed Moscow’s justification for the attack as unfounded, describing it as a response to “hallucinations” about an alleged drone strike on Putin’s residence.
Zelensky said the overnight assault involved a broad array of weapons, including 13 ballistic missiles aimed at energy facilities and civilian infrastructure, 22 cruise missiles and 242 drones. Among the damaged sites was a building at the Qatari embassy, he added.
The Ukrainian leader accused Russia of deliberately targeting the daily lives of civilians during a period of severe cold, stressing that emergency services were working to restore heating and electricity supplies as quickly as possible.
Melissa Enoch
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