Ukraine war: 'Kamikaze drones' hit Kyiv, intense fighting near Donetsk towns
Several explosions were heard on Monday morning in Kyiv, exactly one week after Russian strikes on the Ukrainian capital, AFP journalists noted.
Three explosions were heard successively at around 06:35, 06:45 and 06:58 (05:35, 05:45 and 05:58 CET). The air raid sirens had sounded shortly before the first explosion.
The capital has been attacked by "kamikaze drones", Andriy Yermak, head of the Ukrainian president's staff, wrote on the Telegram messaging app.
Last Monday, Russian bombings on a scale not seen for months hit Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities, killing at least 19 people and injuring 105 others and causing an international outcry.
Meanwhile, intense fighting between Russian and Ukrainian forces was taking place around two towns in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine, Bakhmut and Soledar, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Sunday.
"The key hot spots in Donbas are Soledar and Bakhmut," Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address. "Very heavy fighting is going on there."
Bakhmut has been a target of Russia's armed forces in their slow move through the region since taking the key industrial towns of Lysychansk and Sievierodonetsk in June and July. Soledar is located just north of Bakhmut.
Earlier on Sunday, Russian forces shelled Ukrainian positions on several fronts, the General Staff of Ukraine's Armed Forces said, with the targets including towns in Kharkiv, Donetsk and Kherson regions.
Ukraine's Donetsk and Luhansk regions — which make up the larger industrial Donbas, and the strategically important Kherson province in the south — constitute three of the four provinces Putin proclaimed as part of Russia last month, moves dismissed by Ukraine and its Western allies as illegitimate.
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