NATO was forced to scramble fighter jets after the Russian forces launched one of the biggest drone and missile attacks on Ukraine.
Poland shut two of its airports as explosions rocked Ukraine in a massive overnight attack.
On Wednesday morning, the whole of Ukraine was under an air raid alert, with authorities in several western cities issuing warnings to their residents.
It came after the Russian forces launched a barrage of missiles and drones targeting energy facilities and civilian infrastructure across Ukraine.
Poland, a Nato member bordering western Ukraine, temporarily closed Rzeszów and Lublin airports in the southeast of the country.
The Polish Defence Ministry said it scrambled Polish and allied aircraft as a precaution to safeguard its airspace.
There were reports that two German Eurofighter Typhoons and a pair of Romanian F-16s were also scrambled this morning from Mihail Kogălniceanu and Câmpia Turzii Air Bases in Romania.
Authorities in Kharkiv police said at least 36 people were wounded in the latest overnight attack.
They said the attack damaged more than 10 apartment buildings, a school, a supermarket and an ambulance substation, among other buildings.
Two children aged nine and 13 were among those wounded, police said, adding “doctors diagnosed the children with acute stress reactions”.
Yevgen Vasylenko, regional emergency services spokesperson, said rescuers and police evacuated 48 people, including three children, from the smoke-filled entrance of a high-rise building, citing
Explosions also rocked the western Ukrainian cities of Lviv and Ternopil on Wednesday, Ukrainian media reported.
Moscow has been intensifying its daily drone and missile barrages in recent months, targeting Ukraine’s energy infrastructure and hitting several civilian sites ahead of winter.
Ukraine’s Energy Ministry said: “Russia is once again attacking our energy infrastructure.
“Emergency power outages have been introduced in a number of regions of Ukraine.”
Ukrainian state media reported that a multi-storey residential building had been hit in Ternopil, while a Reuters witness reported power disruptions in Lviv during the attack.
Regional Governor Maksym Kozytskyi said on Telegram that the attack damaged an energy facility and hit an industrial site in Lviv region but caused no casualties, without providing further details.
Images shared on Ukrainian news-monitoring Telegram channels showed a tower block in Ternopil with its upper floors torn away beneath a towering column of black smoke, an orange glow of fire still burning through the haze.
“The enemy is attacking western Ukraine with drones. Do not ignore the alert! Stay in shelters,” Lviv Mayor Andriy Sadovy wrote on Telegram.
“Residents of Lviv region, please do not publish any photos, videos, addresses. Keep the informational silence,” he said.
Ukraine’s energy ministry said Russian attacks had resulted in emergency power outages in a number of regions.
Meanwhile, Russia’s defence ministry said today that Ukrainian forces had fired four US-made ATACMS missiles at the southern Russian city of Voronezh in an attempted strike on civilian targets.
Ukraine’s military said on Tuesday it had attacked military targets in Russia with the ATACMS missiles, calling it a “significant development”.
Kyiv received the systems in 2023 but was initially restricted to using them only on its own territories, nearly a fifth of which are controlled by Russia.
“Russian S-400 air defence crews and Pantsir missile and gun systems shot down all ATACMS missiles,” Russia’s defence ministry said on Telegram.
Falling debris from the destroyed missiles damaged the roofs of a Voronezh retirement home and an orphanage, as well as one house, the ministry said adding that there were no casualties or injured among civilians.
The ministry published pictures of pieces of the missiles and said that air reconnaissance forces identified the Kharkiv region as the location of the ATACMS launch.
Russia said it had fired Iskander-M missiles to destroy two Ukrainian multiple rocket launchers.
Ukraine previously attacked Russian territories with US-made ATACMS missiles in January, firing six missiles on Russia’s Belgorod region.
After Ukraine fired US ATACMS and British Storm Shadow missiles into Russia last year, Putin ordered a hypersonic missile to be fired at Ukraine.
