Third wave of Russian shelling blitz begins in Ukraine

A third wave of Russian missile attacks is now underway in Ukraine. The below footage shows a residential building on fire in Kiev, one of at least three blocks of flats hit in the district of Pechersk, in the city centre. Other explosions have also been confirmed in Lviv, Kharkiv, Vinnytsia, Khmelnytsky, Zhytomyr, Kryvyi Rih and Rivne, with some cities already cut off from electricity. Critical infrastructure and power plants appear once again to be Russia's main target. The Ukrainian goverment has already declared that emergency power cuts must be implemented across the whole country. So far, most of the missile hits have been reported in central Ukraine and the north of the country. President Zelensky's office has described the situation as 'critical'. 

Kyiv now. Two residential buildings were hit. Ukraine is still under Russian missile attack. pic.twitter.com/3gUF6BBCEQ

— Svitlana Morenets (@SvitMore) November 15, 2022

In the previous two waves of Russian attacks, carried out in October, dozens of missiles were fired and about half shot down by the Ukrainian air defence. How many missiles have been intercepted and how many got through Ukraine's defences in this round of shelling is currently difficult to say - according to the Ukrainian air defence, the number of shells launched currently stands at approximately 100. Nevertheless, even intercepted missiles have to land somewhere. Having failed to hold the city of Kherson (Russia is now starting to evacuate from areas even on the right bank of the Dnipro river) and with his army on the run, Putin is left with no option but these missile attacks. The Kremlin's strategy will be to subject Ukraine’s civilian population to electricity and heating outages in the winter.

In Bali, Sergei Lavrov right now is settling down to a G20 summit with other world leaders. Many have been critical of Russia at the summit and even Chinese leader Xi Jingping has called for Ukraine’s borders to be respected. Xi and French President Emmanuel Macron have asked for a ceasefire in Ukraine and for the resumption of peace talks. The Russian missiles raining down on Ukraine shows just how little Russia now cares about the norms of civilised debate or its status as a pariah state. This missile attack is Putin’s response to Zelensky’s peace deal, offered today at the G20 – to Kyiv, his answer is crystal clear.