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Published : 18 Jun 2026, 09:51 AM
Russia attacked Kyiv with missiles and Ukrainian drones hit Moscow's refinery as the both countries exchanged strikes hours after President Volodymyr Zelensky spoke with US 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 Zelensky tried to increase pressure on Russia to negotiate an end to its four-year-long war.
In the Russian capital, drones hit the Moscow refinery, Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said on Telegram, marking the second attack on the facility in a week.
Zelensky 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 Zelensky seemed open to doing something about the war.
Putin had not discussed the possibility of a meeting with Zelensky during his latest phone call with Trump, the Kremlin said this week. Russia has said Ukraine was losing.
Attacks
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. Over four dozen drones heading for Moscow were brought down, Sobyanin said.
"Air defence forces continue to repel a massive attack. Several drones managed to reach the Moscow oil refinery," he said on Telegram, adding that a shopping centre in the Moscow outskirts also suffered minor damage as a result of falling drone debris.
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.
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.
Russia and Ukraine deny deliberately targeting civilians in the war that started with Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
