KYIV (AP/Reuters) – Russia launched its biggest aerial attack against Ukraine overnight, a Ukrainian official said Sunday, part of an escalating bombing campaign that has further dashed hopes for a breakthrough in efforts to end the 3-year-old war.
Russia fired a total of 537 aerial weapons at Ukraine, including 477 drones and decoys and 60 missiles, Ukraine’s air force said. Of these, 249 were shot down and 226 were lost, likely having been electronically jammed.
Yuriy Ihnat, head of communications for Ukraine’s air force, told the Associated Press that the overnight onslaught was “the most massive airstrike,” on the country, taking into account both drones and various types of missiles. The attack targeted regions across Ukraine, including western Ukraine, far from the frontline.
Poland and allied countries scrambled aircraft to ensure the safety of Polish airspace, the Polish air force said Sunday.
Kherson regional Gov. Oleksandr Prokudin said one person died in a drone strike. Six people were wounded in Cherkasy, including a child, according to regional Gov. Ihor Taburets.
The war shows no signs of abating as U.S.-led international peace efforts have so far produced no breakthrough. Two recent rounds of talks between the Russian and Ukrainian delegations in Istanbul were brief and yielded no progress on reaching a settlement.
The Kremlin said in remarks published on Sunday that the tougher the sanctions imposed on Russia by Europe, the more painful the recoil would be for Europe’s own economies as Russia had grown resistant to such “illegal” sanctions.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 triggered a wave of Western sanctions on Russia and it is by far the most sanctioned major economy in the world.
The West said that it hoped its sanctions would force President Vladimir Putin to seek peace in Ukraine, and though the economy contracted in 2022, it grew in 2023 and 2024 at faster rates than the European Union.
The European Commission on June 10 proposed a new round of sanctions against Russia, targeting Moscow’s energy revenues, its banks and its military industry, though the United States has so far refused to toughen its own sanctions.
Asked about remarks by Western European leaders including French President Emmanuel Macron that toughening sanctions would force Russia to negotiate an end to the war, the Kremlin said only logic and arguments could force Russia to negotiate.
“The more serious the package of sanctions, which, I repeat, we consider illegal, the more serious will be the recoil from a gun to the shoulder. This is a double-edged sword,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told state television.
In another development, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has signed a decree on the country’s withdrawal from the Ottawa Convention, which bans the production and use of anti-personnel mines, a senior Ukrainian lawmaker said on Sunday.
Ukraine ratified the convention in 2005 and a parliamentary decision is needed to withdraw from the treaty.
The document is not yet available on the website of the president’s office.