Kyiv, Nov 11: Russian glide bombs, drones and a ballistic missile smashed into cities in southern and eastern Ukraine on Monday, officials said, killing at least six civilians and injuring about 30 others.
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that Russia has recently intensified strikes that have long tormented civilian areas, in an apparent effort to unnerve Ukrainians and wear down their willingness to keep up a war that is approaching its 1,000-day milestone.
“Every day, every night, Russia commits the same terror,” Zelenskyy said in a post on the Telegram messaging app. “Except that an increasing number of civilian objects are becoming targets.” Both Russia and Ukraine are waiting to see how Washington will change its policy on the war after Donald Trump takes office as the US president in January. The US is the biggest provider of military help to Ukraine but Trump has chided the Biden administration for giving Kyiv tens of billions of dollars of aid.
The Ukrainian army intends to expand its mobile units, which are primarily tasked with shooting down drones, in the regions most frequently targeted by Russian strikes, Zelenskyy said on Telegram.
He also said that Ukraine is working on producing its own glide bombs as part of a domestic missile programme. Russian glide bombs have significantly impacted the battlefield, as their destructive power reduces settlements to rubble and makes it increasingly difficult for Ukrainian forces to hold their defensive fortifications.
Ukrainian forces are being slowly pushed backward in the eastern Donetsk region, where Russia is bringing its greater military might to bear. Zelenskyy said Ukraine would conduct a “substantial reinforcement” in areas near the Donetsk settlements of Kurakhove and Pokrovsk, where Ukraine’s army is in danger of being overrun. (AP)
