Russia strikes Ukraine from east to west, killing eight

A Russian ballistic missile and drone barrage across Ukraine has killed at least eight civilians, including children, and wounded dozens of others.

The overnight blitz expanded Russia’s almost daily bombardment of Ukrainian cities as Moscow apparently looked to exploit Kyiv’s critical shortage of Western-supplied anti-ballistic missile defences.

NATO member Poland, meanwhile, was looking into Ukrainian reports that a Russian cruise missile entered its airspace during the onslaught.

The barrage spanned regions across Ukraine, including areas by the border with Poland that are far from the front line in the east of the country and where Ukraine is believed to store and manufacture weapons for its fight against Russia’s more than four-year-old invasion.

Its long-range drones and missiles have battered Russia’s oil sector, causing a fuel crisis.

The attack came two days after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky met in Washington with US President Donald Trump and representatives of American defence companies, as he pleads for swifter and bigger deliveries of Patriot air defence systems that are the best way to stop Russia’s ballistic assaults.

The Iran war has drained stockpiles of the American-made interceptors.

Mr Trump has promised to grant Ukraine licences to build its own Patriots, but production could take a long time to set up.

“Given the critical shortage of air defence missiles from our partners, our warriors are accomplishing truly incredible things, demonstrating a very high level of professionalism,” Mr Zelensky said on social media on Thursday.

“This Russian terror once again proves that protection against the Russian missile threat is the most important task when it comes to saving the lives of our people.”

Mr Zelensky said at least 10 Ukrainian regions were attacked, with dozens of homes, businesses and infrastructure facilities destroyed or damaged.

Russia launched more than 70 missiles, a significant number of them ballistic, he said, along with more than 280 attack drones, of which more than 260 were intercepted.

The Russian defence ministry said it aimed at Ukrainian air bases, arms factories and military telecommunications and logistics facilities.

In the Dnipropetrovsk region, the Russian attack killed six people and wounded 10, said Oleksandr Hanzha, head of the regional military administration.

Children were among the dead, he said on Telegram - a six-year-old girl and boys aged 11 and 17 in the Kryvyi Rih area.

In Kyiv, Russian forces struck the capital with ballistic missiles, killing a 31-year-old man and wounding two others, the National Police press service said.

Residential buildings, a market, a garage co-operative, storage facilities and vehicles were damaged in the city, police said.

A cruise missile attack struck the western city of Lviv, wounding 34 people, including three children ages six, 13 and 15.

In the Poltava region, a drone hit company warehouses, killing one person.

A Russian Kh-101 cruise missile crossed into Poland overnight, violating NATO airspace, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said on X.

Mr Sybiha called it a clear demonstration that strengthening Ukraine’s air defence was urgent and served as a guarantee of wider European protection.

An unidentified object flying westward in the middle of the night was tracked in Polish airspace and an F-16 fighter jet was launched to identify and intercept it, the Operational Command of the Polish Armed Forces said on X.

The object disappeared from radar screens before it could be identified, the command said.

A helicopter flew to its last known location, near the village of Tarnawa-Kolonia in the Lublin province, the command wrote.

Polish authorities have not confirmed what, if anything, crashed.

Prime Minister Donald Tusk travelled to the area on Thursday to inspect the site.

Meanwhile, Russia’s defence ministry said air defences downed 258 Ukrainian drones overnight.

A depot belonging to Wildberries online retailer was set ablaze in Russia’s Penza region southeast of Moscow, in the latest strike on the company’s warehouses.