Russia-Ukraine war live: Kyiv under drone assault after Russia vowed to retaliate for attack on bombers
Update:
Date: 2025-06-06T00:29:10.000Z
Title: Opening summary
Content: Welcome to today's live coverage of the war in Ukraine, where the capital is under attack from Russian drones early and authorities say drone fragments have fallen in different parts of the city.
Witnesses reported a series of explosions in Kyiv, with one of them reporting a large fire at a site where one drone had fallen.
'Enemy drones are approaching one after the other on approaches to the capital from different directions and in the city's airspace,' Tymur Tkachenko, head of the city's military administration, wrote on Telegram.
The attacks came after Russia accused Kyiv of state terrorism over its daring drone operation striking Russian heavy bomber planes at air bases in Siberia and the far north at the weekend and said it it would respond as and when its military saw fit.
Donald Trump said that during a call with Vladimir Putin on Wednesday he urged the Russian president to refrain from retaliating, but fully expected Moscow to strike back.
'It's probably not going to be pretty. I don't like it,' said Trump, who described what he called 'great hatred' between Putin and Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Tkachenko said on Friday that in Kyiv drone fragments had been spotted in three districts on opposite sides of the Dnipro River that bisects the city. One drone had fallen on a building, he said, and details on damage and possible casualties were being collated.
In other key developments:
The IAEA's team at Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant in Ukraine heard repeated rounds of gunfire that appeared to be aimed at drones reportedly attacking the site's training centre, the head of the UN's nuclear safety watchdog said on Thursday. There were no immediate reports of damage to the centre, it said.
Russia launched a series of missiles and drones across Ukraine hours after Trump and Putin spoke on Wednesday. At least five people – including a one-year-old boy, his mother and grandmother – were killed when a drone struck a residential building in the northern Ukrainian city of Pryluky.
German chancellor Friedrich Merz urged Trump to increase pressure on Russia to end the war.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un vowed to 'unconditionally support' Russia in the war at a meeting with top Russian security official Sergei Shoigu, Pyongyang state media reported.
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