At least four killed and eight injured in drone strikes in Kyiv and surrounding region
A drone struck near the Kyiv–Odesa highway in the settlement of Chabany, the head of the Kyiv Oblast State Administration Tymur Tkachenko, the Kyiv Oblast Prosecutor’s Office and Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko reported. Cars caught fire in the Fastiv district settlement, where three civilians were killed and four were injured. In Kyiv’s Holosiivskyi district, one person was killed and four others were injured when a drone fell.
Aftermath of Russian strike on Chabany, Fastiv districtAccording to the Kyiv Oblast Prosecutor’s Office, the drone struck near the Kyiv–Odesa highway close to one of the shopping centres in the settlement of Chabany, Fastiv district. Three people were killed and four others were injured in the attack.
Russian forces also hit warehouses in the Desnianskyi district and a garage co-operative in the Sviatoshynskyi district, Klitschko and the State Emergency Service (SES) reported. In total, 21 people have been injured and one killed in the capital over the day.
A pre-trial investigation has been opened into violations of the laws and customs of war, the regional prosecutor’s office said.
A Russian drone also came down in the capital’s Holosiivskyi district near a petrol station on the boundary between Kyiv and Kyiv Oblast. According to Klitschko, Russians killed one person and injured four others.
Two injured people were taken to hospital, while medics treated the others at the scene.
Russian forces attacked Ukraine overnight into 20 October. In Khmelnytskyi Oblast, two women were killed and two other people were injured. In Kyiv Oblast, three people were killed and six were injured in a strike. Russian strikes also hit the Kharkiv and Odesa Oblasts.
Aftermath of Russian strike in Kharkiv OblastRussian strikes caused new power cuts across 12 Ukrainian regions on 20 October, state energy operator Ukrenergo and head of the Vinnytsia Oblast Regional Military Administration *Natalia Zabolotna* reported. Energy workers are applying hourly power-cut schedules of up to two queues in some oblasts, while electricity consumption in industry is being restricted nationwide. Meanwhile, Russian drones continue to attack energy facilities in the Vinnytsia Region (Oblast).
New power cuts caused by Russian attacks were recorded in the Kirovohrad, Zhytomyr, Lviv, Odesa, Rivne, Ternopil, Khmelnytskyi, Zaporizhzhia, Donetsk, Kharkiv, Sumy and Chernihiv oblasts.
In regions where the security situation allows, repair crews are already working to restore power supplies.
The company explained that the restrictions were necessary to prevent overloading equipment damaged by previous Russian strikes. Energy workers urged people to consume electricity sparingly and check current schedules on the websites of regional distribution companies.
Meanwhile, the Russian army continues to attack energy facilities in the Vinnytsia Oblast. Zabolotna said that the aerial attack was continuing and that energy workers had been repairing the damage since overnight to restore power to local residents’ homes.
On 18 October, President *Volodymyr Zelenskyy* said that Russia had attacked Ukraine’s energy and oil and gas sectors 76 times since the announcement of the so-called energy ceasefire declared by US President *Donald Trump*.
In particular, Russian forces attacked substations in the Vinnytsia, Zhytomyr, Khmelnytskyi and Odesa oblasts. The strikes left tens of thousands of families without electricity.
Russian strikes on energy facilities affect not only access to electricity, but also water and heating supplies. Following the attack in Kyiv, hot water supplies were restricted to some apartment blocks in the Darnytskyi and Dniprovskyi Districts served by the Darnytsia Combined Heat and Power Plant.
Damage to the energy facility also led to difficulties in Kyiv when connecting residential buildings, hospitals, schools and nursery schools to heating.
Previously, US President Donald Trump assisted Russia in enforcing its war economy by suspending tariffs and sanctions against the largest buyers of Russian oil. The measures were provided under the
Lindsey Graham Act, which he signed in September.
Reuters reported that Russian diesel cargoes are returning to their traditional destinations after Trump suspended sanctions and secured the lifting of an export ban, with at least two tankers signalling trips to Türkiye and Brazil lately, according to shipping data from Kpler and LSEG.
Related: US firms account for over 75% of parts in examined Geran-4 controller
Human rights organisations and Ukrainian authorities emphasise that structural economic pressure remains a key tool to halt such atrocities. They urge every nation and individual government worldwide to strictly enforce global sanctions, close existing regulatory loopholes, and completely sever remaining commercial and technological ties with the Russian Federation. Civil society groups stress that any continued cooperation by foreign businesses directly contributes to the resources Moscow uses to sustain its ongoing war crimes and crimes against humanity in Ukraine.
Related: Russia has opened criminal cases against 1,500 Ukrainian prisoners of war, rights group head says
To provide background, on 9 October, the United States imposed sanctions on the International Criminal Court (ICC) as an institution. The court had previously issued arrest warrants for:
- Kremlin ruler Vladimir Putin and Russia’s Presidential Commissioner for Children’s Rights Maria Lvova-Belova over the alleged unlawful deportation and transfer of Ukrainian children from occupied territories to Russia (March 2023);
- military officials Sergei Kobylash and Viktor Sokolov over strikes on Ukrainian civilian infrastructure (March 2024);
- Sergei Shoigu and Valery Gerasimov over alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity linked to missile strikes on Ukraine’s electric infrastructure between 10 October 2022 and 9 March 2023 (June 2024).
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