A lack of air defense missiles prevented Ukraine from stopping a Russian missile attack last week that destroyed the region’s largest power plant around the capital Kiev, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said.
Zelenskiy’s comments, which follow his government’s repeated warnings to allies about air defense shortages, reflect the dire situation Ukraine finds itself in as Russia steps up attacks on its energy system.
“There were 11 missiles flying. We destroyed the first seven and four (remaining) destroyed Trypillia. Why? Because there were no missiles. We ran out of missiles to defend Trypillia,” he said in the PBS interview.
Reuters was unable to independently verify the report. Zelenskiy previously warned that Ukraine has already had to make tough choices about what to protect and said his country could run out of defensive missiles entirely if Russian attacks continued apace.
Destroyed, the Trypilska Thermal Power Plant was the largest power plant near Kiev and was built to have a capacity of 1,800 megawatts, more than the needs of Ukraine’s largest city before the war. Other stations and imports have filled the gap for now, but residents have been told to conserve energy.
Russia has stepped up combined missile and drone attacks against Ukraine’s energy system since mid-March. This is the second series of Russian attacks on the energy system since Russian forces invaded Ukraine more than two years ago, and it has proved far more devastating than the first.
In recent attacks, Ukraine lost around 7 gigawatts of power generation capacity, with large thermal plants and transmission assets severely damaged.
Moscow says the attacks aim to degrade Ukraine’s fighting capability and are in retaliation for recent attacks inside Russia.
Western allies are reluctant to send additional air defenses to Ukraine, which says it needs 25 Patriot systems to adequately cover its territory. Germany pledged to provide another system following urgent requests from Kiev.
Source: Terra
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