Ukraine’s leading private energy provider DTEK said on Sunday it had reconnected power to more than one million homes in Kyiv and surrounding areas, a day after a Russian air assault triggered widespread emergency blackouts.
A coordinated barrage of missiles and drones from Russia early on Saturday cut electricity to a huge number of residents as temperatures fell below freezing.
The strikes killed two people and wounded more than 20 others, including two children, after 500 drones and 40 missiles struck seven districts with such intensity that Poland’s military scrambled fighter jets to safeguard its airspace.
The attack involved Kinzhal hypersonic missiles, Iskander ballistic missiles and Kalibr cruise missiles as well as drones, according to monitoring channels.
In a statement, DTEK said electricity had been restored to 748,000 households in Kyiv and 347,000 outside the city as of Dec. 28.
The company said customers on Kyiv’s right bank had returned to scheduled power outages, while conditions remained “more difficult” on the left bank, where emergency shutdowns were still in effect.
DTEK added that emergency outages were also continuing in two districts of the broader Kyiv region.
In a statement on Sunday morning, Ukraine’s Ministry of Energy wrote that more than 19,000 people were still without power in the Kyiv region due to Russian atacks on energy infrastructure.
It said that repair crews were working around the clock to restore damaged equipment.
“Thank you to our power engineers and rescuers, who often risk their own lives to restore power supply!” the ministry added.
President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Saturday that the bombardment overnight was evidence that “Putin and his entourage... do not want to end the war and are trying to use every opportunity to inflict more pain on Ukraine and increase pressure on others around the world.”
“If Russia turns Christmas and New Year into a time of destroyed homes and burned apartments, destroyed power plants, then this sick activity can only be answered with truly strong steps,” he wrote on Telegram,