Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has renewed his plea to the West for advanced air-defense systems and long-range weapons after at least five people were killed in a Russian drone and missile attack on Dnipro on July 3.
“Only two things can stop this Russian terror -- modern air-defense systems and the long-range capabilities of our weapons,” Zelenskiy wrote in English on X.
“The world can protect lives, and it requires the determination of leaders. Determination that can and must make protection from terror the norm again.”
The Ukrainian leader has long called for better air-defense systems and weapons, with the last request coming on June 30, after a Russian rocket attack killed seven people and wounded 35 others in the city of Vilnyansk, in the southern Zaporizhzhya region.
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The July 3 attack also wounded at least 34 people, according to Zelenskiy. Fourteen houses were destroyed in the strikes, Serhiy Lysak, governor of the Dnipropetrovsk region, said in a message on Telegram. He added that the attack causes multiple fires in the city.
Separately, Ukraine’s Air Force said it had shot down five missiles, including an Iskander-K cruise missile, and six unmanned aerial vehicles, five of which were Shahed-type kamikaze drones. It said the attack mainly targeted Dnipro.
This is the third time that Dnipro has been targeted in the last five days. A high-rise building was destroyed in an attack on June 28, while at least 12 people were wounded in a drone strike on July 1.
Russia also shelled Ukraine’s southern Zaporizhzhya region early on July 3, destroying 14 houses and wounding a man.
On the same day, the Russian Defense Ministry said it had downed a total of 10 Ukrainian drones in three regions, including five in Belgorod, four in Bryansk, and one in Moscow. The ministry added that two unmanned boats heading toward Novorossiysk in the Black Sea were sunk.
Russia has been targeting Ukraine’s electrical grid for months, forcing frequent power outages. In March, Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said 80 percent of the country’s thermal-generation capacity had been destroyed. Around the same time, the Energy Ministry said thermal power plants controlled by Tsentroenerho and Ukrhydroenerho had been badly damaged.
Last month, Zelenskiy asked the European Union to step up electricity exports to Ukraine, as well as to supply necessary equipment and other resources to make repairs.
Zelenskiy met with Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof on July 3 and said on Telegram that he is counting on the Netherlands to expand training missions for Ukrainian pilots.
The Dutch government previously supplied F-16s to a training facility in Romania, where Ukrainian pilots and ground staff are being taught to fly and maintain the planes in battle.
Schoof said on X that the Netherlands' support for Ukraine is “rock solid” and that Amsterdam “will continue to support Ukraine politically, militarily, and financially against Russian aggression, whatever it takes and for as long as it takes.”
Over the past several months, Ukraine has increasingly targeted fuel-production sites inside Russia, mainly oil-refining facilities that work for the Russian military.