Kyiv came under a ballistic missile and drone attack overnight, with at least two people killed and 11 injured after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned of an impending “massive” attack by Russia.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko, writing on the Telegram messaging platform, said the roof of a hotel was on fire early on Thursday morning. Pictures posted online showed a fire burning out of control at the top of the building on the central Shevchenko Boulevard.

“Kyiv is under attack from ballistic missiles and UAVs,” Klitschko wrote. He later said that 11 people were injured, with others trapped in a damaged nine-storey residential building, and the roof of another high-rise apartment building on fire.

The AFP news agency later said two people had been killed in the attacks, according to city authorities. Pictures shared on unofficial Telegram channels showed city residents crowding into underground stations to shelter from the Russian strikes.

Journalists with AFP in the central and eastern districts of Kyiv reported hearing more than a dozen explosions as Ukraine’s Air Force warned that ballistic missiles were approaching the city.

The strikes on Kyiv came just hours after Zelenskyy warned of an imminent “massive Russian strike” and urged Ukrainians to take shelter. “We know that [Russian President Vladimir] Putin has been preparing a massive strike against Ukraine for some time,” he said during a joint news conference in Dublin.

Zelenskyy accused Russia of “completely refusing to end the war” it launched in February 2022, despite Ukrainian efforts through “all possible official and unofficial channels” to convey readiness for “meetings and meaningful negotiations”.

Source: www.aljazeera.com