Russia unleashed a widely anticipated air campaign against Ukraine’s energy grid on Wednesday, hitting power facilities and infrastructure around Kyiv and other regions in the heaviest combined attack on energy sites in months.
The strikes, in which Ukrainian officials said seven people were killed, followed days of intensifying drone barrages primarily on the capital, a prelude to what many Ukrainians expect to be a winter of attacks intended to plunge cities into cold and darkness when Ukraine is short of air defences.
Ukraine’s state power grid operator Ukrenergo said it had imposed emergency power cuts as a result of the attack in Kyiv and three surrounding regions — the first time such a measure had been imposed in the capital since the spring.
Russian attacks last winter, which brought record-low temperatures, ravaged power and heating systems, forcing Ukrainians to adapt to dire circumstances.
