Five wounded in Kyiv by Russia's largest drone attack on Ukraine

According to officials, Ukraine's capital suffered the largest drone attack by Russia during the ongoing war on Saturday. The attack caused leaving five people wounded and disrupted the peace as the noise of air defenses and explosions woke residents at sunrise.

The attack began hitting in the early hours of Saturday, targeting different areas of Kyiv, with additional waves occurring as the sun rose. The air raid alert lasted for six hours.

The chief of the air force, Mykola Oleschuk, said that out of the 75 drones launched at Ukraine, 71 were successfully taken down. Oleschuk commended the effectiveness of the "mobile fire" units, which are typically rapid pickup trucks equipped with a machine gun or flak cannon on their flatbeds. These units were responsible for downing almost 40% of the drones.

Using the Telegram app, Mayor Vitali Klitschko reported that the attack resulted in injuries to five individuals, including an 11-year-old girl. Buildings in various districts across the city also suffered damage. Klitschko mentioned that fragments from a downed drone caused a fire at a children's nursery. 

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy highlighted that the attack occurred during the early hours of the day when Ukrainians commemorate the tragic Holodomor famine of 1932-33, during which millions of people perished from starvation.

In a message on Telegram, he said , "Wilful terror - The Russian leadership is proud of the fact that it can kill." Ukraine's leadership has previously drawn parallels between the Holodomor and Russia's ongoing invasion.

Ukraine, along with more than 30 other nations, recognizes the Holodomor as a genocide against the Ukrainian people by the Soviet Union, which controlled Ukraine at the time and aimed to suppress its quest for independence.

Moscow denies that the deaths were a result of a deliberate genocidal policy and asserts that Russians and other ethnic groups also suffered from the famine. 

The target of the attack on Saturday remains unknown, but Ukraine has been cautioning about Russia's potential air campaign to dismantle their energy system, similar to what occurred last winter.

As a consequence of the attack, Ukraine's energy ministry reported that approximately 200 structures in the capital, including 77 residential buildings, lost power.