Russia slammed Ukraine with a “massive” attack that killed at least one child and knocked out power in nine regions, including parts of the capital city Kyiv, Ukrainian officials said Friday.

The overnight missile and drone strikes on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure were aimed at depriving residents of heat as frigid weather hits the area, said President Volodymyr Zelensky.

“ It was a cynical and calculated attack,”  Zelensky wrote on X. “It is precisely the civilian and energy infrastructure that is the main target of Russia’s strikes ahead of the heating season.”

A seven-year-old child in the country’s southeast was killed during the blackout blitz and at least 20 others were injured, authorities said. 

Russia’s Ministry of Defense said in a statement it launched the “massive” strike in response to “the terrorist attacks by the Kyiv regime on civilian targets on Russian territory.”

Roughly 28,000 families were still without power Friday morning in the Kyiv region, Governor Mykola Kalashnyk said.

“We had no power or water when I left my house. I can’t get to work because subway is not operating and buses are overflowing,” said Anatoliy, a 23-year-old student.

“I’m hoping for the best but I don’t even know how to reach the other bank [of the Dnipro river that runs through Kyiv,” he said, after spending the night in his hallway because of loud explosions.

The strike also damaged energy infrastructure in the central region of Poltava, where around 17,000 consumers were without power, regional officials said.

Ukrainian private energy firm DTEK said its thermal power plants had suffered major damage in the attack but did not immediately provide more details.

Ukraine’s Prime Minister, Yuliia Svyrydenko, called the attack “one of the largest concentrated strikes” against Ukraine’s energy infrastructure since the war began in February 2022.

With Post Wires