First responders attempt to put out fires after Russian airstrikes on Ukraine’s second city Kharkiv, 7 March 2025. Photo: EPA-EFE / State Emergency Service of Ukraine
Russia launched missile strikes against energy facilities across Ukraine in the early hours of Friday morning, just hours after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced that delegations from Ukraine and the US would meet for talks on ending the war in Saudi Arabia next week.
Writing on Facebook, Ukrainian Energy Minister Herman Halushchenko said that Russia was “continuing its energy terror” by targeting facilities in multiple regions of Ukraine with “massive rocket and drone fire”.
“Russia seeks to inflict pain on ordinary Ukrainians by shelling energy and gas production facilities, aiming to leave us without electricity and heat and causing maximum harm to ordinary citizens”, Halushchenko said, adding that work was ongoing to stabilise energy supplies.
Regional authorities reported that energy facilities had come under fire in Ukraine’s northern Chernihiv region, its central Poltava region and its western Ternopil and Ivano-Frankivsk regions, with neighbouring Poland scrambling fighter jets to secure its airspace amid the strikes on areas near its border with Ukraine.
State oil and gas company Naftogaz said that its gas production facilities had been damaged in the strikes, which it said were the 17th such attack on its facilities by Russia since the start of the full-scale war three years ago.
The State Emergency Service of Ukraine also reported overnight strikes on the northeastern city of Kharkiv, where eight people were injured, and the southern Odesa region.
Just a few hours before the attacks, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had said that Russia could demonstrate its commitment to ending the war through “two forms of silence: no attacks on energy and other civilian infrastructure” and “no military operations in the Black Sea”.
Writing on X after what he called a “very productive day” with EU leaders in Brussels on Thursday, Zelensky announced the first high-level talks between Ukraine and the US since his public dressing down at the White House last Friday, with delegations from the two countries set to meet in Saudi Arabia next week.
“Ukraine is working and will continue to work constructively for a swift and reliable peace”, Zelensky said, adding that he would be meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman himself in Riyadh on Monday before leaving his team to stay on in the country for what he hoped would be “meaningful” talks with the US.