Deadly Russian strikes hammer Kyiv on eve of Trump trip to critical NATO summit

 

Russia launched a deadly attack on Kyiv in the early hours of Monday

Reuters

Ukraine’s capital Kyiv came under a deadly Russian attack early Monday morning, on the eve of a critical NATO summit in Turkey that US President Donald Trump plans to attend.

Massive fiery explosions lit up the night sky as ballistic missiles and drones hammered parts of the city, killing at least 11 people and wounding dozens more, city officials said.

Residential buildings were badly damaged in the assault, leaving people trapped in multi-story apartment blocks, while cars were seen burning on city streets.

There was “destruction and damage” in four districts of the city, Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said, adding that the Podilsky district was hit the hardest.

Rescuers evacuated residents, including children, from the upper floors of a damaged building in the district early Monday, while many in the capital spent hours in air raid shelters.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had warned just hours earlier that Moscow was “preparing a new massive strike,” and the fresh assault comes just days after a ferocious Russian attack on Kyiv killed 30 people last Thursday –– the third deadliest attack on the capital since the war began.

Rescuers work at the site of an apartment building, which was heavily damaged during Russian missile and drone strikes in Kyiv, Ukraine, on July 6, 2026.

Valentyn Ogirenko/Reuters

“This is typical of Putin: right after America’s Independence Day and before the NATO Summit in Ankara,” Zelensky said Sunday in a post on X ahead of the attack.

Residential buildings in Kyiv’s southeastern Darnytskyi district, an area of the city that suffered significant damage last week, were also badly damaged in the Monday strikes.