Russia launched a series of major attacks against Ukraine this week, launching more than 1,000 drones in the past 36 hours as Moscow launches new operations on the battlefield.
The Ukrainian Air Force said about 392 aircraft were launched between Monday night and Tuesday. More than 550 shots were fired at targets across the country on Tuesday in a rare and deadly daylight attack, the military said. And Russia launched 147 more drones overnight into Wednesday, striking more than a dozen locations, the Air Force added.
The massive attack comes as Russian forces launch a spring offensive in eastern Ukraine that includes the use of dozens of tanks and armored vehicles, Ukrainian military and analysts told CNN earlier this week. The attacks are accelerating as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy warns of the consequences for his country of the Middle East conflict.
Zelenskiy said Tuesday’s drone attack injured at least 40 people across the country, including five children.
At least two people were killed in an attack on a maternity hospital in Ukraine’s western Ivano-Frankivsk region, the region’s governor, Svitlana Onyshchuk, said. Ivanofrankivsk’s mayor, Ruslan Martshinkikh, said the victims included a national guard and his 15-year-old daughter. They were in the maternity ward visiting the wife of a soldier who had just given birth to a son a few days earlier.
Four other people were injured, including a 6-year-old child. A 59-year-old man was killed and 11 others injured in Vinnytsia, Mayor Serhii Morgunov said.
Yuri Ignat, a spokesman for the Ukrainian Air Force, said the drone was fired into central-western Ukraine and that “this was one of the largest attacks of the entire day.”
“Russia’s attacks on March 23-24 represent a significant inflection in Russian offensive tactics, allowing Russia to threaten more areas of Ukraine for longer periods of time and disproportionately influence civilian areas,” Washington-based think tank Institute for the Study of War (ISW) said in its latest analysis.
Lviv Mayor Andriy Sadovy announced on Tuesday that at least 22 people were injured in the attack.
The Air Force said at least 15 attacks were confirmed and at least 541 drones were shot down or disabled.
Ukrainian officials said residential buildings and city centers across the country were damaged, including a maternity hospital in Ivano-Frankivsk.
A church building in Lviv’s Bernadin monastery complex, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, was also damaged, said Maksim Kozytsky, head of the military administration of the Lviv region.
“The Bernardine Abbey complex, an architectural monument of national importance, has been damaged,” Kozicki wrote on Telegram, adding that experts do not yet know the extent of the damage.
“The site is located within the historic center of Lviv and is on the list of international cultural heritage sites under enhanced protection,” Kozicki said. “The fire gutted the building adjacent to the complex.”
“The scale of this attack clearly shows that Russia has no real intention to end this war,” Zelenskiy said in an evening speech.
“The war against Iran has further complicated the geopolitical situation, and unfortunately this is emboldening Russia,” Zelenskiy added in a statement on Tuesday. “Russia continues this war and the destabilization of Europe, supporting the Iranian regime with intelligence, thereby prolonging the war in the region, while preparing for new conflicts in the coming years. The constant threat of war on the map must be stopped.”
Meanwhile, in Russia, a 55-year-old man was killed and 13 others injured in a Ukrainian drone attack in the Kursk region, Deputy Governor Alexander Hinshteyn announced on Tuesday.
Russia’s Ministry of Defense announced Wednesday that Ukraine launched 389 drones toward Russia overnight.
Meanwhile, Russia is stepping up its attacks in eastern Ukraine.
“With changing weather conditions, the Russian aggressor is intensifying pressure across several sections of the front,” Ukrainian military commander Oleksandr Shirushkyi said last week.
According to ISW, there are indications that the Russian military is planning to intensify ground operations against several areas of Ukraine’s so-called fortified zone, including the cities of Kramatorsk and Kostyantynivka, both of which are key defense centers in the country.
Another focus of the Russian attack is the town of Lyman in the Donetsk region, also on the edge of the region’s fortified zone.
Despite making modest gains in most of the battlefields in recent months, the Kremlin continues to insist that capturing the rest of Ukraine’s four eastern regions remains the goal of what it calls a special military operation.
Ukrainian forces still hold about 20% of Donetsk and large parts of Kherson and Zaporizhia, analysts said. Ukraine strengthened its position in the south last month.
