New Russian strikes have targeted Ukraine’s energy infrastructure. Water was also shut off in some areas on Saturday morning.
More than a million homes are without electricity in Ukraine after new Russian strikes targeting energy infrastructure on Saturday. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accused Moscow of a “massive attackwith 36 rocket attacks on his country in the night from Friday to Saturday. “The aggressor continues to terrorize our country“, he denounced on his Telegram channel.
“To date, 672,000 subscribers have been disconnected in the Khmelnytskyi region, 188,400 in the Mikolaiv region, 102,000 in the Volyn region, 242,000 in the Cherkasy region, 174,790 in the Rivne region, 61,913 in the Kirovograd region and 10,500 in that of Odessa“, counted an adviser to the Ukrainian presidency, Kyrylo Tymoshenko, Saturday afternoon.
It was the national operator Ukrenergo which, earlier in the day, had launched the alert first. Referring to the attackof the main networks in the western regions of Ukraine», the operator warned of damage including «the scope is comparable or could exceed the consequences of the attack of October 10-12“. Two days after the explosion on the Crimean bridge, Russian reprisals had already affected 30% of Ukrainian power plants according to President Zelensky. The Ukrainian government then asked the population to “restrict» his electricity consumption and not to switch on energy-intensive appliances «from 5 p.m. to 11 p.m.“.
New energy restrictions
In western Ukraine, electricity and water were cut Saturday morning in some areas of the Volhynia region, according to its governor. The town of Khmelnytsky was without power and city officials called on residents to prepare for water cuts. In the Rivne region, also in the West, Governor Vitali Koval said that attacks had targeted the “energy infrastructurein the area, damaging electricity substations. Power cuts were also reported in the Odessa region (South-West) after “two missile strikes on energy infrastructureof the region“, Governor Maxim Marchenko said.
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Energy restrictions are “forcibly applied” in several regions, including the capital kyiv and its region, said Ukrenergo, promising that its specialists “take all measures to restore electricity supply as soon as possible in regions currently without electricity“.
But Ukrainians have already voluntarily reduced their electricity consumption by 5% to 20% on average on certain days and in certain regions, Ukrenergo boss Volodymyr Kudrytsky told AFP in a written statement. “We are grateful to the people who have reduced consumption at home and to the companies who are doing the same“, he added.
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