Deadly attack on Dnipropetrovsk: Ukraine calls for increased air defence

At least nine people were killed and 28 were injured in a morning attack by Russia on the Dnipropetrovsk region in Ukraine. Seven civilians, including three children, died in the city of Synelnykove, while two people were killed in Dnipropetrovsk.

Early in the morning, Russians once again launched an attack on Ukraine. They deployed 14 drones and launched 22 different types of missiles for this purpose. The most severely affected area in the attack was the Dnipropetrovsk region. Rescue operations are still in progress.

In the Synelnykove area, over ten private homes suffered damage. The fire service has successfully extinguished the blazes ignited by the attacks. Six individuals lost their lives, including two children aged six and eight. Additionally, six more civilians, among them a child, sustained injuries - as reported on Telegram by Ihor Klymenko, the head of the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the State Emergency Service.

The Ukrainian prosecutor's office later confirmed that the death toll had risen to seven - another injured child succumbed to their injuries in the hospital.

Two of the fatalities were residents of the regional capital, Dnipro, where 20 civilians were injured. A Russian missile strike partially demolished a four-story residential building in Dnipro, igniting a fire that spread over an approximate area of 1,000 square meters, according to the DSNS report. A railway station in the city also sustained damage.

The rescue teams additionally reported three injuries in Kryvyi Rih.

Oleksandr Vilkul, the head of the military administration in the city, reported that the Ukrainian anti-missile defence systems intercepted about 10 missiles in the airspace over the Dnipropetrovsk region.

Following the attack on the Dnipropetrovsk region, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky reiterated his call for allies to supply his country with more air defence systems.

"Every country that provides air defence systems to Ukraine, every leader who aids in convincing our partners that air defence systems should not be stored in warehouses but rather deployed in the real cities and communities that are experiencing terror, and everyone who backs our defence, they save lives," Zelensky emphasised.

"Russia must be held accountable for this terror, and every missile and every Shahed drone must be intercepted. The world has the means to achieve this, and our partners possess the necessary capacity. This has been proven, for instance, in the airspace over the Middle East and should also be effective in Europe," the Ukrainian president added in a statement on Telegram.