As Ukraine heads into 2023 still fighting for its freedom, Russian President Vladimir Putin launched a new round of “mass missile attacks” on Saturday, targeting residential areas instead of infrastructure, Ukraine’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Dmytro Kuleba said.
“This time, Russia’s mass missile attack is deliberately targeting residential areas, not even our energy infrastructure. War criminal Putin “celebrates” New Year by killing people,” Kuleba tweeted Saturday morning. “Russia must be kicked out of its UN Security Council seat which it has always occupied illegally.”
A Kyiv resident told Newsweek that she feared for her life when she heard the air sirens go off around the city.
“It was very loud and scary,” Daryna Antoniuk said. “The explosions began before I reached the bomb shelter. I started running. Then it turned out that the missiles hit very close to my house.”
On Thursday, Russia’s Ministry of Defense said it will “never” run out of missiles after launching several attacks across the Eastern European nation.
The Moscow Times reported that the ministry’s remarks were in response to claims made by Western intelligence that Putin is struggling in his war against Ukraine.
Putin’s troops have struggled to achieve substantial victories in Ukraine throughout the year. In the fall, Ukraine launched its own counteroffensive, recapturing thousands of square miles of formerly occupied territory. Experts view the war as exposing the weaknesses in the Russian leader’s military, such as an apparent struggle to maintain well-trained, motivated troops.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian cities including Kyiv, Lviv and Odessa were all heavily struck by Russian missiles on Thursday as Putin’s army hit infrastructure impacting those cities’ energy grids. Russia has repeatedly targeted Ukraine’s energy grid causing widespread blackouts as winter approaches.
Rajan Menon, director of the Grand Strategy program at Defense Priorities, told Newsweek on Saturday, “As with the attacks on Ukraine’s infrastructure, Russian strikes on its residential sites, which Moscow will doubtless insist were in fact military targets, are meant to erode public morale and burden the Ukrainian economy even further as a long winter commences.”
Menon continued: “The attacks will certainly increase Ukraine’s economic difficulties, but they will strengthen Ukrainians’ morale and determination to prevail. This was evident to me during my most recent visit to wartime Ukraine this month.”
Ukrainian government official, Sergiy Kyslytsya, also tweeted on Saturday about the missile strikes, saying, “On the last day of 2022 Moscow has launched yet another missile attack on Ukraine, a civilian’s killed & Japanese journalist’s wounded. There’s no purgatory for war criminals, they go straight to hell” I said on the day invasion was launched, I remind now.”