Ukraine imposes emergency power outages as Russia attacks energy grid

A day after Russia launched massive attacks on energy infrastructure, Ukraine has imposed an emergency power outage in large parts of the country.

Power outages were in effect in all but three regions following a drone and missile attack on energy targets on Saturday that injured at least 19 people.

The Ukrainian state-owned electricity grid operator Ukrenergo said the shutdowns would affect both industrial and private customers.

Russian attacks on Ukraine’s power grid in recent weeks forced the government to impose nationwide power outages.

Without adequate air defenses to repel such attacks and carry out repairs, shortages could become even more severe when demand surges in late summer and the bitter cold of winter.

The most serious recent attacks included a barrage in April that damaged Kyiv’s largest thermal power plant and a massive attack on May 8 that targeted power generation and transmission facilities in several regions.

Following Saturday’s attack, the Ukrainian Air Force announced on Sunday that air defenses had shot down all 25 drones launched overnight.

Meanwhile, Russia claimed on Sunday that it had taken control of the village of Umanske in the partially Russian-occupied Donetsk region.

The new Russian offensive in the north is focused on the Kharkiv region, but it also appears to include tests of Ukrainian defenses in Donetsk further south and incursions into the northern regions of Sumy and Chernihiv.

In Russia, six people were injured in an attack on the town of Shebekino in the Belgorod region on the border with Ukraine, regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said on Sunday.

At the Shangri-La Security Conference in Singapore, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy accused China of helping Russia undermine an international peace summit scheduled to take place in Switzerland later this month.

“Russia is using its Chinese influence in the region, including using Chinese diplomats, and is doing everything it can to disrupt the peace summit,” he said. “It is unfortunate that such a large, independent and powerful country as China is an instrument in Putin’s hands.”

Zelensky said more than 100 countries had confirmed their participation in the summit, which will take place from June 15 at a resort above Lake Lucerne in central Switzerland.

Also on Sunday, White House national security adviser John Kirby confirmed that President Joe Biden had authorized Ukraine to use some U.S.-supplied weapons to launch attacks inside Russia in an effort to reduce the “incredible downward pressure” Russia is exerting on Kharkiv.