Russia's 12-hour Kyiv attack kills 12 as Ukraine schools reopen

Kyiv,UPDATED: Sep 1, 2026 21:02 IST

Russia launched an overnight aerial attack on Kyiv that lasted more than 12 hours and continued into Tuesday, killing at least 12 people and injuring more than a dozen others, including three children, Ukrainian authorities said. The strikes on the capital and eight other regions came on the day millions of Ukrainian schoolchildren returned to classes for the new school year.

The attack was the sixth straight day of heavy Russian strikes on Kyiv, in what Ukrainian officials said was an effort to wear down civilians by disrupting daily life. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said those killed included an Indian citizen, and that nearly 350 emergency workers were deployed in Kyiv and the surrounding region.

Authorities said civilian infrastructure and residential buildings were hit in several districts of Kyiv. Eight people were killed in the city and four others in the surrounding region. Six employees of state-owned railway company Ukrzaliznytsia were among those killed in Kyiv after a ballistic missile struck a depot and other property, company chairman Oleksandr Pertsovskyi said in a social media post. First responders worked through the rubble of damaged apartment buildings to free trapped residents.

Ukraine's air force said the assault began at 6 pm on Monday and involved ballistic, cruise and anti-radar missiles, along with 218 drones and decoys. It said about a third of the drones were jet-powered, making them harder to intercept than propeller-driven versions. The main targets were in the Kyiv and southern Odesa regions. In Odesa, regional head Oleh Kiper said civilian infrastructure was damaged and one person was injured. Two residential buildings were damaged, a fire broke out at a textile factory, and Russian forces also hit the Orlivka international ferry crossing on the border with Romania. In the northern Zhytomyr region, shelling caused fires at an industrial facility and a warehouse, Ukraine's Emergency Service said.

The Russian Defence Ministry said its forces carried out a "massive strike" on Ukraine with "precision-guided weapons" and long-range drones. It said the attack targeted facilities used to manufacture and store weapons, as well as military-related infrastructure. Meanwhile, the ministry said Russian air defences intercepted 516 Ukrainian drones overnight over 18 Russian regions, along with the illegally annexed Crimean Peninsula and the Black Sea. In the Leningrad region, Governor Alexander Drozdenko said a drone strike caused a fire at the port of Ust-Luga, one of Russia's largest oil and gas export terminals, more than 800 kilometres from Ukraine.

At a meeting of European Union defence ministers in Ireland, EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said Russia was struggling on the battlefield and had stepped up attacks from the air. "Russia's war is becoming more ruthless and destructive, but it's unfortunately not closer to ending," she said. "Russia's army is bogged down on the ground, and that is why they are killing civilians from the skies." The war in Ukraine was also discussed on Monday at a summit involving the leaders of China, Russia and India.

The latest Russian attack underlined the intensity of the air war, with Kyiv facing a sixth consecutive day of heavy strikes, deaths in the capital and surrounding region, damage across multiple areas, and fresh claims from both sides about overnight drone and missile attacks.

With PTI Inputs

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