Russia launches major missile, drone attack on Ukraine

Russia fired scores of missiles and drones at targets across Ukraine on Sunday, crashing into energy and rail infrastructure and residential buildings, just two days before the fourth anniversary of Moscow's all-out invasion.

The capital Kyiv, regularly targeted by Russian missile and drone attacks since the start of the full-scale invasion, has faced waves of overnight strikes in recent weeks as Moscow has intensified assaults amid freezing winter temperatures.

"Moscow continues to invest in strikes more than in diplomacy," Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said of the attack on social media, adding that Russia launched about 50 missiles and 300 drones overnight.


"The main target of the attack was the energy sector. Ordinary residential buildings were also damaged, and there is damage to the railway."

The intense barrage came the same day Hungary said it would block the EU's latest package of sanctions against Russia, unless Ukraine re-opens a key oil pipeline that supplies the country.

Ukraine says the Druzhba pipeline that crosses its territory to deliver Russian oil to Slovakia and Hungary was damaged late January by Russian strikes.

In Kyiv and its region, the Sunday overnight strikes killed one man and wounded a dozen more, among them four children, Ukraine's national police said.

AFP saw rescuers sifting through debris of a largely destroyed two-storey house in Kyiv's suburb of Sofiivska Borshchagivka.

"I felt the building shaking. It was clearly a hit, and the force (of the explosion) was strong. I jumped up because my dog got scared too," Olga, a 48-year-old woman who lives in the settlement, told AFP.

Anton, also from the area, said there were no military installations in Sofiivska Borschagivka. "Only people live here -- schools, kindergartens, private houses — so it's definitely not connected to any military facilities or any kind of industry," he said.