KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russian missiles and drones struck at least four Ukrainian regions overnight, killing five people, officials said Tuesday. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said his country’s forces had damaged two more Russian oil refineries in their latest long-range strikes.
The continuing exchange of aerial attacks, even as front-line positions remain largely unchanged, provided the backdrop for Zelenskyy’s visit to the United States.
U.S. President Donald Trump has called on Zelenskyy to halt strikes on Russian oil refineries and other infrastructure used to produce and distribute diesel, saying the attacks are contributing to global shortages and higher prices. The supply crunch has also been aggravated by reduced oil shipments through the Strait of Hormuz following the outbreak of the Iran war.
Kyiv began targeting Russian refineries after Moscow repeatedly attacked Ukraine’s power grid. Zelenskyy has offered to halt Ukraine’s strikes if Russia ends its attacks on energy infrastructure.
Zelenskyy was scheduled to meet Trump and other world leaders at the U.N. General Assembly in New York. He is seeking their help to end Russia’s more than 4½-year-old full-scale invasion.
Russia's President Vladimir Putin is not due to attend the annual event.
The war, which Western officials say has killed more than 500,000 Russian troops, has had global repercussions. Western analysts estimate that Ukraine has recorded more than 500,000 military casualties, including up to 140,000 deaths.
Zelenskyy also wants help to ensure the flow of Ukrainian grain and other farm products to world markets through the Black Sea. Russian attacks on cargo vessels have severely disrupted Kyiv’s exports, hurting its economy and threatening global supplies.
Russia and Ukraine have in recent years accounted for around 30% of the world’s wheat exports and 12% of corn exports, most of it shipped through the Black Sea. But last month, attacks slashed both countries’ agricultural exports by two-thirds, Thomas de Waal of the Brussels-based think tank Carnegie Europe said in a report Tuesday.
“The lack of that grain in world markets puts several African countries at risk of famine, while world cereal prices, already pushed up by the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, could rise even higher,” he said.
French President Emmanuel Macron said on Tuesday that France would provide Ukraine with additional radar systems to help protect its power grid.
Macron said in a social media post that he had discussed with Trump a possible truce between Moscow and Kyiv that would halt strikes on energy infrastructure, as well as a “moratorium” on attacks in the Black Sea.
Zelenskyy began his visit to New York by meeting with U.S. senators. He thanked them for what he described as strong bipartisan support for Ukraine and for backing a tougher sanctions bill against Russia that Trump signed into law.
Peace and security would be closer once the legislation was fully implemented, Zelenskyy said.
He said on social media that he had briefed senators on de-escalation proposals he planned to discuss with Trump later Tuesday.
In Kyiv, Iryna Panina awoke around 2 a.m. on Tuesday as a jet-powered Russian drone approached her home. The blast shattered a window and left her apartment covered in debris.
Panina, 36, said she had lost hope in international efforts to secure peace.
“As an ordinary person just trying to live and survive each day, I find it hard to believe they fully understand what’s actually happening, how hard it is, and how much ordinary people are suffering,” she told The Associated Press.
Zelenskyy also planned to press Trump for more U.S.-made Patriot air defense systems, which Kyiv says it urgently needs to intercept Russian ballistic missiles.
Zelenskyy said that Ukrainian special forces struck the Kuibyshev oil refinery in Samara, southeast of Moscow, and another refinery in the neighboring Bashkortostan region in overnight attacks.
One person was killed and four others were wounded in the Samara attack, regional Gov. Vyacheslav Fedorishchev said. He said that “the enemy targeted industrial facilities,” but didn’t specify which ones.
The Russian Defense Ministry on Tuesday said that its forces downed 297 Ukrainian drones over 14 Russian regions overnight, as well as the illegally annexed Crimean Peninsula.
Russia’s overnight attack on Ukraine included anti-ship missiles, ballistic missiles, cruise missiles and more than 200 drones, Ukraine’s air force said.
The strikes killed four people in the central Ukrainian city of Dnipro, said Oleksandr Hanzha, head of the Dnipropetrovsk regional military administration. A drone also killed a woman in the northern Sumy region, local police said.
The strikes across Ukrainian regions damaged homes, businesses and storage facilities, wounding at least five people, authorities said. Five people were wounded in the capital, Kyiv, according to officials.
The Russian Defense Ministry said Tuesday that its forces struck metallurgical and chemical industries, the fuel and energy sector, and the military-industrial complex, as well as port infrastructure facilities in four regions of Ukraine.
They included a Fire Point plant in Kyiv producing components for long-range cruise missiles and a tobacco factory in the central Poltava region used to make small arms ammunition, it said.
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Barry Hatton reported from Lisbon, Portugal. AP reporters Volodymyr Yurchuk and Srdjan Nedeljkovic in Kyiv, Ukraine, contributed to this report.
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Follow the AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine
