Ukraine says 'vast majority of electricity consumers' lost power after Russian strikes

Ukraine’s Energy Ministry says 'vast majority of electricity consumers' have lost power after Russian strikes.  A punishing new barrage of Russian strikes on Ukrainian infrastructure on Wednesday caused power outages across large parts of the country — as well as neighboring Moldova — further hobbling Ukraine’s battered electricity network and adding to civilians’ misery as winter begins.

Multiple regions reported attacks in quick succession and Ukraine’s Energy Ministry said that “the vast majority of electricity consumers were cut off.” Officials in Kyiv said three people were killed and nine wounded in the capital after a Russian strike hit a two-story building. Russia has been pounding the power grid and other facilities with missiles and exploding drones for weeks and the energy system is being damaged faster than it can be repaired. In the aftermath of the strikes, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy tweeted that he has instructed Ukraine’s ambassador to the United Nations to request an urgent meeting of the Security Council.

Murder of civilians, ruining of civilian infrastructure are acts of terror. Ukraine keeps demanding a resolute response of international community to these crimes,” Zelenskyy said. Russia’s deputy U.N. ambassador Dmitry Polyansky said in a statement on Telegram that such a meeting has been called for 4 p.m. local time, or 2100 GMT.

Before the latest barrage, Zelenskyy had said that Russian strikes had already damaged around half of Ukraine’s energy infrastructure. Rolling power outages have become the horrid new normal for millions — and the latest barrage affected water supplies too. Ukrainian officials believe Russian President Vladimir Putin is hoping that the misery of unheated and unlit homes in the cold and dark of winter will turn public opinion against a continuation of the war but say it’s having the opposite effect, strengthening Ukrainian resolve.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said Wednesday that “one of the capital’s infrastructure facilities has been hit” and there were “several more explosions in different districts” of the city. He said water supplies were knocked out in all of Kyiv. Kyiv resident Oleksii Kolpachov told The Associated Press that he heard an explosion as he was going up an escalator out of the subway.

“Then the electricity suddenly disappeared. When I got out of the subway, there was a column of smoke,” Kolpachov said.

There were power outages in parts of Kyiv, while power was out in the wider Kyiv region, in the northern city of Kharkiv, the western city of Lviv, and in all or part of the Chernihiv, Kirovohrad, Odesa and Khmelnytskyi regions. In Moldova, Infrastructure Minister Andrei Spinu said that “we have massive power outages across the country,” whose Soviet-era energy systems remain interconnected with Ukraine.

It was the second outage this month in Moldova. The country’s pro-Western president, Maia Sandu, said in a statement that “Russia left Moldova in the dark.” She said the future of Moldova, a country of about 2.6 million people, “must remain toward the free world.” Moldova’s foreign minister said the Russian ambassador was being summoned to give explanations.

Ukraine’s state-owned nuclear operator, Energoatom, said the strikes led to the country’s last three fully functioning nuclear power stations all being disconnected from the power grid in an “emergency protection” measure. It said they would resume supplying electricity as soon as the grid is “normalized.” Energoatom said on its Telegram channel that radiation levels at the sites are unchanged and “all indicators are normal.”

The Energy Ministry said the attacks also caused a temporary blackout of most thermal and hydroelectric power plants, and transmission facilities also were affected. Power workers were working to restore supply, “but given the extent of the damage, we will need time,” it said on Facebook. Ukraine’s Air Force said Russia launched around 70 cruise missiles on Wednesday and 51 were shot down, as were five exploding drones.