Russian strike on Ukraine’s capital kills 5, with more possibly trapped under damaged Kyiv apartment building

Kyiv, Ukraine – A Russian drone and missile attack on Ukraine’s capital overnight killed at least five people and injured others, according to Ukraine’s emergency services. Emergency crews were still working Monday morning to rescue people they believed to be trapped under the debris of one partially collapsed apartment building in Kyiv.

Elsewhere in Ukraine, another person was killed and eight injured in the city of Bila Tserkva, around 53 miles southwest of the capital.

The strikes came nearly a week after a combined Russian attack on Ukraine last Tuesday killed 28 people in Kyiv, 23 of them in a residential building that collapsed after sustaining a direct hit by a missile. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called that attack one of the biggest bombardments of the war, now in its fourth year.

In the early hours of Monday, drones and missiles hit residential areas, hospitals and sports infrastructure in numerous districts across Kyiv, emergency services said, with the most severe damage occurring in the Shevchenkivskyi district, where one section of a five-story apartment building collapsed.

Five people were confirmed dead in the attack on the building while 10 others, including a pregnant woman, had been rescued from a nearby high-rise that also sustained heavy damage in the blast.

Dozens of vehicles, some burned out and others mangled by flying debris from the blast, formed a snarl in the courtyard in front of the building, which had collapsed down to the second floor.

Onlookers, some wrapped in blankets, watched tearfully as the cleanup operation took place. Dozens of volunteers worked to remove broken glass, downed tree branches and other debris.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko told reporters from the scene that “we very much hope that the death toll will not increase,” but that rescue workers were still searching the collapsed building for further casualties.

President Trump is last known to have spoken with Russian leader Vladimir Putin several days before Moscow’s previous major attack on Kyiv.

After that June 14 call, Mr. Trump said he and Putin had spent most of their time discussing the ongoing Israeli strikes on Iran, and “much less time was spent talking about Russia/Ukraine, but that will be for next week.”

That was before the U.S. joined Israel in attacking Iran’s nuclear sites over the weekend — a decision by Mr. Trump that the Kremlin said on Monday it “strongly condemns” and considers “irresponsible.”

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday that Putin had no plans to speak again with Mr. Trump in the wake of the U.S. strikes on Iran – a country that Moscow has increasingly aligned with in recent years – “but if necessary, such contacts can now be organized quite quickly.”