Ukraine’s northeastern city of Kharkiv came under attack by Russian drones for a second consecutive night on March 31, causing injuries and material damage, Ukrainian officials said.
Writing on messaging platform Telegram, Ihor Terekhov, mayor of Kharkiv, said Russian drones had injured three people and set industrial buildings ablaze.
“Five industrial buildings of one of the research and production enterprises were damaged,” he said, adding that 11 apartment buildings had also been damaged.
Terekhov said the second attack had targeted the largest and oldest district of Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city.
The Ukrainian air force said the second attack had involved a total of 131 Russian drones, along with two Iskander-M ballistic missiles.
Air defenses shot down 57 drones, while 45 others failed to reach their targets as a result of electronic countermeasures, the air force said.
Oleh Sinehubov, governor of Ukraine’s Kharkiv region, said the nighttime attacks coincided with a Russian aerial bomb strike on March 30 on the city of Kupiansk.
According to Sinehubov, that attack left five people injured and damaged an apartment building in Kupiansk, which sits to the east of Kharkiv.
Russian forces captured Kupiansk after Moscow launched its invasion of Ukraine in early 2022. Later the same year, however, Ukrainian troops retook the city.
The Epoch Times could not independently verify the reported Russian attacks on Kharkiv and Kupiansk.
The reported attacks on Kharkiv and Kupiansk occurred a week after the United States brokered a cease-fire deal calling on both Russia and Ukraine to refrain from staging strikes on each other’s energy infrastructure.
But since the deal was agreed to on March 24, each side has accused the other of violating its terms.
On March 30, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy claimed that Russia had launched more than 1,000 drones at Ukrainian targets within the prior week alone.
Moscow has claimed that Ukraine conducted multiple drone attacks on Russian energy facilities over the same period.
Both sides say they are using precision weapons against military targets to avoid civilian casualties.
‘Serious’ Western Response
In recent remarks, Zelenskyy said Kyiv expects a “serious response” from its Western allies to repeated Russian attacks on Ukrainian energy targets.“Our partners must understand that these Russian strikes target not only our people, but also all international efforts ... aimed at ending this war,” he said in a March 29 video address.
“We expect a ... serious response.
“We are working to ensure there is a strong reaction, especially from America, Europe, and all those ... who rely on diplomacy.”
Hours after Zelenskyy made the remarks, Russia reportedly carried out the first of its two consecutive drone attacks on Kharkiv.
In his March 29 address, Zelenskyy also said that he had discussed Ukrainian cross-border operations—inside Russian territory—with Kyiv’s top military commander, Oleksandr Syrskyi.
“We are maintaining active measures that prevent the occupiers from advancing into [Ukraine’s] Sumy and Kharkiv regions,” Zelenskyy said.
For the past eight months, Ukrainian forces have held a steadily shrinking swath of territory in Russia’s western Kursk region—which shares a border with northeastern Ukraine—after staging a cross-border offensive last summer.
“Fierce battles are ongoing in Guyevo ... and in the area of Basovka,” the source said about two border communities in Kursk, according to TASS.
“Our fighters continue to push Ukrainian troops out of Guyevo. Fierce battles are underway in the settlement itself and on its outskirts.”
