Firefighters extinguish a blaze following Russian strike in the Kyiv region
Kyiv: Russia launched the largest drone attack on Ukraine since the start of the war more than three years ago, Ukrainian officials reported Monday. According to Yuriy Ihnat, head of the Ukrainian air force’s communications department, the Russian assault on Sunday night involved 355 drones. In addition, Russian forces fired nine cruise missiles during the attack, causing injuries among some civilians, though no deaths were immediately reported.
This attack follows a massive combined drone and missile strike on Saturday night targeting Kyiv and other regions, which killed at least 12 people and injured dozens. Ukrainian authorities described that assault as Russia’s largest aerial offensive in the conflict to date, involving 69 missiles of various types and 298 drones. These figures have not been independently verified, and Russian officials have not commented.
Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump criticised Russian President Vladimir Putin for escalating the conflict, declaring on social media that Putin had “gone absolutely CRAZY.” Trump expressed frustration at Putin’s intensified bombing campaigns, saying the missiles and drones are “being shot into cities in Ukraine for no reason whatsoever,” and warned that if Putin attempts to conquer all of Ukraine, it “will lead to the downfall of Russia.”
Trump also voiced dissatisfaction with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, stating that Zelenskyy is “doing his country no favours by talking the way he does.” The US, alongside European leaders, continues efforts to broker peace, but these attempts have yielded little progress so far.
In a rare moment of cooperation amidst the conflict, Russia and Ukraine conducted the third and final part of a large prisoner exchange on Sunday. Russia’s Defence Ministry confirmed that each side released 303 soldiers, following previous releases of 307 combatants and civilians on Saturday and 390 on Friday. This swap marks the largest prisoner exchange of the war.
Earlier this month, during face-to-face peace talks in Istanbul — the first since the conflict began — Kyiv and Moscow agreed to exchange 1,000 prisoners of war and civilian detainees each. The prisoner swap remains the only concrete outcome from the negotiations.
With PTI inputs