Russia attacks Kyiv as Ukraine's Zelenskiy speaks to Trump, Europe

The Ukrainian capital came under attack from Russian missiles, Kyiv authorities said on Thursday, as they urged residents to take shelter hours after President Volodymyr Zelenskiy spoke with U.S. President Donald Trump and European leaders.

A Reuters witness heard explosions in Kyiv and authorities in the northeastern Ukrainian city of Sumy said one person was killed in a drone attack. Air strike alerts were issued for most of Ukraine's territory.

"The enemy is attacking the capital with ballistic missiles. Stay in safe places until the air raid alert is over!" Tymur Tkachenko, the head of Kyiv's military administration, said in a Telegram post early on Thursday.

The attack on Kyiv is the second this week and came as Zelenskiy tried to increase pressure on Russia to negotiate an end to its four-year-long war.

He said he had spoken to Trump and French President Emmanuel Macron, plus other leaders, on the sidelines of a Group of Seven meeting in France. He described it as a "coordinating conversation" to try to end the war.

Earlier this week, a major attack on Kyiv by Russia killed 10 people and damaged a 1,000-year-old monastery that symbolises Ukraine's spiritual and cultural heritage, drawing condemnation from European leaders. Russia denied striking the monastery.

Trump said on Wednesday that Russia was losing more soldiers than Ukraine, after he suggested that both Russian President Vladimir Putin and Zelenskiy seemed open to doing something about the war.

Putin had not discussed the possibility of a meeting with Zelenskiy during his latest phone call with Trump, the Kremlin said this week. Russia has said Ukraine was losing.

ATTACKS

In the Ukrainian city of Enerhodar, where most of the staff of the Russian-held Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant live, Russia-appointed Mayor Maksim Pukhov said on Telegram that Ukrainian strikes killed one person and injured four.

In Russia's Belgorod border region, local officials said a Ukrainian drone strike killed one man in his car. On Wednesday, Moscow had accused Ukraine of attacking a bus carrying Belarusian schoolchildren, an accusation Kyiv said was "false".

In the southern Russian region of Rostov, a Ukrainian drone attack killed one, injured two and caused a fire at two commercial facilities, local officials said. More than three dozen drones heading for Moscow were shot down, they said.

Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said on Telegram a shopping centre in the outskirts of Moscow suffered minor damage as a result of falling drone debris, adding there were no casualties.

Reuters could not independently verify the reports.

Flames and thick plumes of smoke were seen in Moscow's southeastern district of Kapotnya, where Moscow's oil refinery is located, a Reuters witness said.

A Ukrainian drone strike on Tuesday halted operations at the refinery, sources said, adding to widespread damage inflicted on Russian energy facilities and extending the fuel crisis deeper into the country.

Russia, the world's third-biggest oil producer and a major oil and fuel exporter, is set to import fuel by sea this month as it seeks to manage a gasoline shortage following extensive drone attacks on its refineries, according to industry sources.

Russia and Ukraine deny deliberately targeting civilians in the war that started with Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

(Reporting by Jekaterīna Golubkova and Ron Popeski; Editing by Nia Williams and Neil Fullick)

Copyright Reuters or USA Today Network via Reuters Connect.

This story was originally published June 17, 2026 at 8:09 PM.