Russian strikes kill seven in Ukraine as Moscow vows no ‘pause’ to war

• Russian strikes across Ukraine killed at least seven people on Sept 23, including attacks on Kyiv and other regions, with more than 40 wounded and critical infrastructure targeted.
• Russia vows no "pause" in the war despite international calls, accusing Europe of trying to arm Kyiv; Ukrainian officials condemn attacks on civilian data centres.
• The Black Sea port of Odesa saw further attacks on commercial vessels, prompting Turkey to call for a halt to strikes on civilian shipping amid ongoing conflict.

KYIV - Russian strikes across Ukraine killed at least seven people on Sept 23, including two in a new barrage on Kyiv, as it vowed there would be no “pause” in Europe’s worst conflict since World War II.

The attacks came ahead of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s address to the UN General Assembly in New York, where he was expected to make a new appeal for better air defences against the intensifying Russian drone and missile campaign.

But Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told the UN Security Council there would be no “pause” in the war. He accused Europe of seeking a a halt to fighting to “pump the Kyiv regime with weapons”.

Russia has pummelled the wider Kyiv region at an intensity unseen since March 2022, weeks after the Kremlin invaded Ukraine, while stepping up attacks across the rest of the country, according to an AFP analysis of figures from the ACLED conflict monitor.

Kyiv officials said that on top of the new deaths, more than 40 people were wounded in strikes on gas stations, offices, a college building, businesses and the rail network, while the internet was cut to some 100,000 households.

Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha accused Russia of putting civilian lives at risk by targeting data centres “to disrupt the flow of information” on the threat from incoming missiles and drones.

“This is critical civilian infrastructure that ensures people can access life-saving information,” he said. “It is not a military target. It is essential to keeping everyday life functioning.”

AFP reporters in Kyiv saw clouds of smoke across the city amid air-defence explosions, while the smell of burning filled the air as commuters headed to work.

Artem Derevyaha said he and his colleagues evacuated the canteen where they work after a strike hit their building.

“Everyone went out, and we had literally just moved two metres away when the second strike happened,” he said.

“You just have time to lie down on the floor, that’s all.

“You don’t have any thoughts in your head.”

US appeal

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters at the UN General Assembly that Washington was pushing for both sides to end attacks on energy targets.

US President Donald Trump, meanwhile, invited Russia’s President Vladimir Putin to attend the Group of 20 summit in Miami in December, as the White House struggles to secure a deal to end the conflict.

In a sign of how the Kyiv region has suffered, AFP analysis of data from the ACLED armed conflict monitor showed that there were more Russian strikes in the first 18 days of September than in any full month since the start of the war apart from March 2022.

A total of 118 incidents have been recorded this month. In March 2022, as the invasion gathered pace, there were 174 in the whole month.

Elsewhere in Ukraine, at least four people were killed, including a young child, when a residential building was hit in Oleksandrivka, west of Kramatorsk, in the eastern Donbas region.

Ukraine’s Human rights commissioner Dmytro Lubinets said four other people were wounded but up to eight more, including two infants, might still be under the rubble.

Turkey protests

In Ukraine’s Black Sea port of Odesa, the captain of a cargo ship was killed in a Russian attack - part of a wave of strikes from both sides on commercial vessels designed to hit export revenues.

The head of the Odesa region, Oleg Kiper, said the vessel was sailing under the flag of Antigua and Barbuda.

At least 226 civilian and commercial vessels have been hit on the Black Sea since the start of the conflict, Turkey’s IMEAK chamber of shipping said.

Seventy per cent - or 163 attacks - took place in the first eight months of this year, prompting Turkey to call on both sides to halt attacks on civilian ships.

Russia’s defence ministry said its latest attacks on the Kyiv region hit a warehouse and business linked to the production of military drones. Similar sites were hit in the Odesa area, as well as a vessel delivering military cargo, it added. AFP