Russia's 11-hour strike on Kyiv kills 18 after Ukraine hits oil refineries

Russia launched an 11-hour drone and missile attack on Kyiv overnight into Thursday morning, killing at least 18 civilians and injuring more than 90 others, Ukrainian officials said. Moscow said the barrage was retaliation for Ukrainian long-range strikes on Russian oil facilities.

The attack came as Ukraine has stepped up strikes inside Russia, especially on oil refineries, in what President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has described as a 40-day blitz. Ukrainian officials say they are trying to force President Vladimir Putin to the negotiating table, but Russia has responded with more strikes. Recent diplomatic efforts to end the war, including by the Trump administration, have not produced results.

Explosions shook the Ukrainian capital through the night as air raid warnings sent many residents into subway stations for shelter. Emergency crews were still searching through the rubble of collapsed and burned apartment buildings at daybreak. Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha called it a "night of horror" in Kyiv. Tymur Tkachenko, head of the Kyiv City Military Administration, said damage was recorded at 30 locations across the city, mainly in residential buildings and civilian infrastructure. Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko said around 20 residential buildings were damaged.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said more than 90 people were injured. In the Desnianskyi district, people were trapped inside a damaged nine-storey residential building, while in the Darnytskyi district six floors of a nine-storey building collapsed. Kyiv resident Serhii Budko, 24, said three or four ballistic missiles hit his district. "We were inside the shelter and felt the shelter shaking - the ceiling and floor, everything," he told The Associated Press.

Russia's Defence Ministry said the attack used "high-precision long-range weapons" and drones against "military industry facilities and fuel and energy complexes in Kyiv and the Kyiv region, as well as military airfield infrastructure in four other regions of Ukraine". Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Gen. Valery Gerasimov had reported the results of the "massive retaliatory strike" to Putin, and said the bombardment was "exclusively against military or military-linked targets". Ukrainian officials rejected that justification. Sybiha said Ukraine was acting in self-defence under Article 51 of the UN Charter while Russia remained the aggressor. He also said the death toll could rise as rescue work continued.

Ukraine's air force said Russia fired 74 missiles, including 24 ballistic missiles, and 496 drones of various types. Ukrainian officials have repeatedly asked partner countries for more air defence systems and missiles, saying ballistic missiles are harder to intercept and that Patriot systems offer the best protection. Elsewhere, a Russian guided bomb strike in the central Dnipropetrovsk region killed a seven-year-old girl and wounded four other members of the same family, including an 11-year-old girl, regional head Oleksandr Hanzha said.

Ukraine's General Staff said its forces struck one of Russia's largest oil refineries overnight in the Nizhny Novgorod region east of Moscow, starting a fire. It also said Ukrainian forces hit a railway bridge over the Siverskyi Donets River in Russian-occupied Luhansk region that was used to transport personnel, weapons and military supplies. As both sides continued long-range strikes, rescue teams in Kyiv kept searching damaged buildings after one of the deadliest attacks on the capital in recent months.

With PTI Inputs