Latest Russian strikes more than just revengepublished at 10:28 British Summer Time 27 August

10:28 BST 27 August

Frank Gardner
Security correspondent

It is tempting to see these Russian attacks on cities and infrastructure as simply Vladimir Putin’s revenge for the humiliation of having parts of his country invaded and occupied by his smaller and supposedly weaker neighbour Ukraine.

Kyiv was already braced for a symbolic attack to coincide with Saturday’s independence day.

Remember that Putin does not believe Ukraine has a right to exist as an independent nation, that instead it is an inseparable part of "Greater Russia".

And to some extent, this is just that: a form of blind revenge that reveals the Kremlin’s fury and frustration at being so far incapable of dislodging the Ukrainian force that has inserted itself into Russia’s soft underbelly like a cunning parasite.

But there is also a calculated Russian strategy behind these massed missile and drone attacks across Ukraine.

Knock out the country’s power grid ahead of winter and Ukrainians will become so exhausted and demoralised they will beg their government to sue for a peace deal, which will of course be on Moscow’s terms.

That strategy didn’t work in the winter of 2022 to 2023, nor the next winter. The Ukrainian population has been incredibly resilient.

But like a boxer that keeps landing blows in the same place, Russia is repeating the motion, hoping to wear down its opponent.

The governor of Russia's Belgorod region says the situation on the border with Ukraine was "difficult but under control" after reports of a Ukrainian attack.

Belgorod borders the Kursk region, where Ukrainian forces have seized Russian territory since beginning an incursion three weeks ago.

"There is information that the enemy is trying to break through the border of the Belgorod region," Vyachesla Gladkov writes on Telegram.

"According to the Russian defence ministry, the situation on the border remains difficult, but under control. Our military is carrying out planned work. Please remain calm and trust only official sources of information."

Russia's strikes are a "symbolic act" by Moscow in response to Ukraine crossing Putin's "last biggest red line", a senior Ukrainian military official says.

Major Volodymyr Omelyan tells the BBC's Newsday programme that Russian troops "precisely targeted" Kryvyi Rih, the home city of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, hitting the neighbourhood where his comedy show, 95th Quarter, "was established".

Zelenksy was a comedian before becoming president in 2019. The 95th Quarter show, which he toured across Ukraine, made him famous.

Omelyan says Putin wants to strike "at the very heart" of Zelensky after Ukraine launched its incursion into Russia's Kursk region three weeks ago.

Image source, Getty Images

The head of the UN's nuclear agency is visiting at a power plant in Russia's Kursk region, following Ukraine's incursion there three weeks ago.

Rafael Grossi says he will "independently assess what is happening" at the plant, "given the serious situation".

"The safety and security of all nuclear power plants is of central and fundamental concern to the IAEA," Grossi adds.

Ukrainian forces are just 40km (25 miles) away from the nuclear power plant, having crossed the border and taken territory in Russia's Kursk region.

Russian President Vladimir Putin last week accused Ukraine of attempting to attack the plant – a claim Kyiv has not yet responded to.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has vowed that Kyiv will respond after the country was struck by another round of Russian strikes overnight.

He says rescue operations are ongoing, but that at least four people have been killed and 16 others were injured in the attacks.

Russia used "over 90 aerial targets against civilians and infrastructure", he says, including 81 drones, and cruise, ballistic, and air-launched ballistic missiles.

"We will undoubtedly respond to Russia for this and all other attacks. Crimes against humanity cannot go unpunished," Zelensky adds in a post on social media.

Image source, EPA

US President Joe Biden has condemned Russia's strikes on Ukraine yesterday, saying Moscow will "never succeed" in its ongoing war.

He said Washington would continue to support Ukraine's energy grid.

"I condemn, in the strongest possible terms, Russia's continued war against Ukraine and its efforts to plunge the Ukrainian people into darkness", Biden said in a post on X.

"Russia will never succeed in Ukraine, and the spirit of the Ukrainian people will never be broken."

Nick Beake
Reporting from Sumy region

The latest deadly barrage sent from Russia - the second in consecutive days - proves why Ukraine needs much greater help from western allies, argues President Zelensky.

He wants more assistance in two ways. First, he says, British, American and other partners need to urgently grant permission for Ukraine to use western-made, long-range weapons to hit ammunition stores, planes and airfields deeper inside Russia.

This would reduce Moscow’s ability to wreak terror over the skies of Kyiv, Zaporizhzhia, Kryvyi Rih and other cities that have been targeted in the last 48 hours, he contends.

But if mass aerial attacks continue to be launched, President Zelensky says there must be a more coordinated and concerted effort to stop Russia’s missiles and drones killing civilians and crippling Ukrainian energy infrastructure.

Last night, he seemed to point to the way that Israel was given huge assistance in shooting down the vast majority of the huge barrage that was sent from Iran and its proxies in April.

The Zelensky team, while stressing their gratitude for ongoing western support, are often quick to point out geopolitical parallels or military comparisons which they claim demonstrate why Ukraine should be better served by its allies.

These allies continue to calibrate the level of military support they are giving to Ukraine, while keeping in focus the overriding concern they’ve had since the start of the full-scale invasion - not provoking a potentially catastrophic wider war with Russia.

Ukraine shot down five missiles and 60 drones during Russia's attack overnight, the Ukrainian air force says.

Russia launched 10 missiles and 81 drones, it adds in a statement shared on Telegram.

Here's the latest images from the central Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rih, where rescue workers have been sifting through the ruins of a hotel following another wave of strikes overnight:

Image source, Reuters

Image source, Reuters

Image source, Reuters

Image source, Reuters

Ukrainian air defences shot down around 15 drones and several missiles near Kyiv during Russia's latest attack, the head of the city's military administration says.

"Everything that flew to the capital of Ukraine was destroyed," Serhiy Popko says on Telegram.

Image source, Reuters

• Russia targeted Ukraine with another wave of strikes overnight, with Ukrainian officials reporting that at least four people were killed
• Air raid alerts were issued early in the morning, as Ukrainian monitors detected Russian aircraft launching hypersonic missiles

• A civilian infrastructure building was hit in the eastern city of Kryvyi Rih late on Monday, killing two. Several people are missing
• Zaporizhzhia regional administration head Ivan Fedorov said one man had been killed and a man and a woman injured in the city of Zaporizhzhia
• Explosions have also been reported in Kyiv, Sumy, Khmelnytsky and Mykolayiv regions

• The latest round of attacks come a day after Russia hit Ukraine with one of the biggest air attacks of the war, killing at least seven people and injuring dozens more, with blackouts in many cities
• Launches of several hypersonic Kinzhal (dagger) ballistic missiles, which are hard for air defences to intercept, have been detected

Stay with us for more.

Aoife Walsh
Live editor

At least four people have been killed after Russia launched a second wave of strikes across Ukraine overnight – a day after one of its biggest air attacks of the war.

Air raid alerts were issued early on Tuesday, with explosions heard in several cities.

Russia says long-range air and sea-based precision weaponry had been used to strike power stations and related infrastructure across the country, including in Kyiv, Lviv and the Kharkiv and Odesa regions.

Ukraine's air defence force is warning that the whole country is under threat of a ballistic weapon attack.

We'll be bringing you the latest developments and analysis here, so stay with us.

Will Vernon
BBC News

It’s clear the main target of this attack was energy infrastructure, but this is also an attempt by Moscow to strike at Ukraine’s reserves of another key resource: morale.

Ukrainians were electrified by the recent successful incursion of their troops deep into Russian territory in the Kursk region.

It’s been a year of bad news on the battlefield for Kyiv, with Russia gaining ground steadily in the eastern Donbas region. There have been problems with mobilisation and reports that Ukraine is running out of men.

But the videos of soldiers hoisting the Ukrainian flag over Russian villages they had seized gave a badly-needed boost to Ukrainian morale.

And it showed the West that Kyiv is still capable of carrying out complex, daring and – most importantly – successful offensives.

With today’s strikes, Russia is intending to bring ordinary people in Ukraine back down to earth with a bump – reminding them, and politicians in western capitals, that the Kremlin still has the upper hand in this war.

The message from Moscow: make no mistake, Russia can still inflict misery on the Ukrainian population whenever it chooses.

Image source, EPA

Explosions rang out in several cities including Kyiv on Monday morning, as more than half of the country's regions came under a major Russian attack.

Here's a look back at the key developments:

• At least six people have been killed after Russia targeted 15 Ukrainian regions, authorities said
• Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelensky said more than 100 missiles and around 100 attack drones were launched
• Russia claimed it used high-precision weapons to hit energy infrastructure - with power and water outages reported in many Ukrainian cities

• A Ukrainian foreign ministry official later confirmed that a hydropower plant in Kyiv had been targeted

• Elsewhere, Polish authorities began a search for an object that entered the country's airspace during Russia's attack - the armed forces said it was most likely a drone

We will be ending our live coverage following closing analysis from our correspondent Will Vernon.

You can follow further updates on this story here - and listen to the latest Ukrainecast episodes here.

Ukraine's foreign minister has reiterated Kyiv's call to its allies to allow it to execute long-range strikes within Russia, following Moscow's major attack on Ukraine today.

Posting on X, Dmytro Kuleba refers to two decisions that partners can make to help "deter Russia".

"First, affirming Ukraine's long-range strikes on all legitimate military targets on Russian territory.

"Second, agreeing to use partners' air defence capabilities to shoot down missiles and drones close to their airspace."

Earlier today, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said: "Ukraine must not have restrictions on the range when terrorists have none."

Thomas Copeland
Live reporter

We've heard from President Zelesnky this morning that "about a hundred Shahed drones" were used in what he called "one of the biggest combined strikes" on Ukrainian territory.

Shahed drones are also known as "kamikaze" drones and they've played a huge role in the war so far.

Western intelligence agencies say Russia has been using Iranian-made Shahed-136 drones in the conflict since the autumn of 2022.

The drone has explosives in a warhead on its nose, it's designed to loiter over a target until it is instructed to attack and it can be hard to detect on radar.

Iran's government says it supplied "a small number" of drones to Russia before the war, external.

But the US and the European Union have accused Iran of sending regular deliveries of drones to Russia, and the EU has imposed sanctions in response, external.

• Read more about are 'kamikaze' drones here.

This morning, Russia's defence ministry wrote on Telegram that nine unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) were shot down over the Saratov region overnight.

You can watch below footage, that we have verified, of a drone striking an apartment building in that same region, which is 560 miles (900km) from the Ukrainian border.

Details of casualties are not known.

Our colleagues at Radio 4 earlier heard from professor of International Affairs at The New School in New York City, Nina Krushcheva, who spoke from Moscow.

Asked about the perception of the war within Russia, she says the war is "getting closer" both in Kursk following the Ukrainian incursion, but also "in people's minds".

"The goods are less, the prices are higher, there is much more military rhetoric coming out of everywhere," she adds.

Asked about Putin, Krushcheva describes him as "slightly frozen" since the Ukrainian incursion.

Referring back to an early appearance after the start of the incursion, which had been broadcast, she explains that he read from "little pieces of paper" which was unlike him.

Krushcheva further suggests he had difficulty pronouncing the words written down - saying Putin is typically a good speaker so it was a bit "confusing".

She adds that Putin has been known to take time to figure out his response when there is a "surprise".

We can bring you some pictures now from a village in the Zaporizhzhia region of southeastern Ukraine.

At least one man was killed in this area after his house was hit by a Russian strike, the regional head says.

Image source, EPA

Image source, EPA

Image source, EPA

Image source, EPA

Thomas Copeland
Live reporter

Russia has confirmed that it targeted Ukrainian energy infrastructure in its overnight aerial attacks.

This is a strategy the Russian military has pursued since early into this full-scale invasion.

Ukrainian officials say these attacks are a concerted effort to damage the power network ahead of the winter months.

President Zelensky said today that the country's energy sector has suffered "a lot of damage".

Here's what we know about the scale of that damage:

• Strikes on power infrastructure have been reported in 10 regions across Ukraine, from Rivne and Volyn in the northwest, to Zaporizhzhia in the southeast
• Authorities in the capital say that energy and water infrastructure were targeted, including a hydropower plant in the Kyiv region where a dam was damaged

• Russia's Defence Ministry claims it struck electricity substations in nine Ukrainian regions and gas compressor stations in three regions
• The Ukrainian national power grid operator has been forced to bring in emergency blackouts to keep the system working
• Power cuts and water supply outages are being reported in many areas, including in parts of Kyiv
• Neighbouring Moldova, whose power network is linked to Ukraine's, reported small disruptions to its grid