Kyiv Russian attacks wound 18, mayor says

Russian missile and drone attacks overnight wounded 18 people in Kyiv, Mayor Vitaliy Klitschko said Thursday, after authorities in the Ukrainian capital warned of a missile threat.

AFP journalists heard about a dozen strong explosions in the city in the early hours. Klitschko said the attack was continuing in the morning.

Officials had reported damage to a residential building and an office building in Kyiv's Dniprovsky district, with debris falling across the area. The Odesa City Military Administration said a 19-storey apartment block in the southern port city was also damaged, destroying several floors.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said civilian infrastructure was hit and damage was reported in eight regions. The strikes wounded seven people in the Odesa region and three in the Zaporizhzhia region, according to the latest figures supplied by Ukrainian officials.

Ukraine has repeatedly sought more support to defend against Russia's invasion. US lawmakers approved broad new sanctions on Wednesday targeting Russia's energy and defence sectors, President Vladimir Putin and other senior officials, as well as what Washington describes as Moscow's shadow fleet of tankers used to bypass Western sanctions.

Zelensky called the timing of the vote symbolic because it came during another night of Russian attacks. Russia has increased bombardments of Ukrainian cities in recent months, and the United Nations has reported that Ukraine's civilian death toll in 2026 has reached its highest level since the first months of the war.