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Russian attacks on Kyiv area kill 10 and injure dozens, Ukraine says

Published: 24 Jun. 2025, 09:34

An explosion of a missile lights up the sky over the city during a Russian drone and missile strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine in Kyiv on June 23. [REUTERS/YONHAP]

Waves of Russian drones and missiles in and around Kyiv overnight killed 10 people, including one child, lit up the night sky with fires in residential areas and damaged the entrance to a metro station bomb shelter, Ukrainian officials said on Monday.

Rescue workers pulled bodies from the rubble of an apartment block in Kyiv's busy Shevchenkivskyi district, less than one kilometer (0.62 miles) from the U.S. embassy. At least nine people died in the district, the interior ministry said.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko visits the site of an apartment building hit during Russian drone and missile strikes, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine in Kyiv on June 23. [REUTERS/YONHAP]

Valeriy Mankuta, 33, described clambering from his window to the third floor below to escape after his building was hit by what authorities said was a missile. Reuters photos showed several explosions above apartment buildings in the area.

"There were bricks on me, there was something in my mouth. It was total hell. I woke up in the rubble," said Mankuta, a construction worker.

At least 34 people, including four children, were wounded in the attacks on Kyiv, the emergencies service said.

From midnight until almost dawn, the city shook with explosions and rattling machine-gun fire from antiaircraft units aiming at the drones.

Ukraine's air force said it had downed 339 of 352 drones and 15 of 16 missiles launched by Russia in the attack on four Ukrainian regions.

Rescuers work at the site of the Russian drone and missile strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine in Kyiv on June 23. [REUTERS/YONHAP]

In the area around the southern Black Sea port of Odesa, regional governor Oleh Kiper said the number of people killed in a separate missile attack had risen to three. Eight people were being treated for injuries.

Moscow has stepped up drone and missile strikes on Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities in recent weeks as talks to end the war, which began with Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022, yielded few results.

Monday's strikes come a day before NATO's annual summit is held in The Hague, while President Volodymyr Zelensky visited Britain to discuss defense.

Thousands of civilians have been killed in the conflict — the vast majority of them Ukrainian — although both sides deny targeting them. Russia has not commented on the latest attacks.

Firefighters battled a blaze at the swimming pool of the National Technical University, also known as the Kyiv Polytechnic Institute, Reuters photos showed. The large campus has a department working on aerospace technology. Several academic buildings and four dormitories were also hit, the polytechnic said.

Debris lie at the site of an apartment building hit during Russian drone and missile strikes, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine in Kyiv on June 23. [REUTERS/YONHAP]

Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko said people could still be under the rubble of buildings after the overnight attacks caused damage in six of the city's 10 districts.

An entrance to the metro station in Kyiv's Sviatoshynskyi district was also damaged, officials said.

Kyiv's deep metro stations have been used throughout the war as some of the city's safest bomb shelters.

In the broader Kyiv region that surrounds the Ukrainian capital, a 68-year-old woman was killed and at least eight people were injured, officials said.

Russia launched one of its deadliest attacks on Kyiv last week, when hundreds of drones killed 28 people and injured more than 150.

Reuters