Russia attacked Ukraine overnight with hypersonic “Oreshnik” missiles as it mounted one of the biggest aerial assaults of the war on the capital and surrounding region.One of the intermediate-range ballistic missiles, capable of carrying multiple conventional or nuclear warheads, targeted the area of Bila Tserkva 90km south of Kyiv, according to the Ukrainian president’s office and an air force spokesperson.
It came hours after President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the US embassy warned of an imminent large-scale attack.
Moscow has previously launched two Oreshnik missiles at Ukraine. The first struck the south-eastern city of Dnipro on November 21 2024; the second hit infrastructure in the western Lviv region, near the Polish border, on January 9 this year. Sunday’s Oreshnik strike marked the closest to the capital yet.