Ukraine-Russia war latest: 10 injured in Kharkiv attack as Putin’s forces launch mass drone assault

A Ukrainian war crimes investigator was pictured photographing the site of the Russian missile attack on Kharkiv which left 10 people injured, the Associated Press reports.

Russia’s land forces are now larger than when Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine in February 2022 but their quality has decreased, a top Nato military official has said.

“The quality of those forces has gone down,” Nato’s highest-ranking military officer Admiral Rob Bauer said, pointing to the state of the force’s equipment and the level of training of its soldiers.

“At the moment, the Russians are not the same threat as in February 2022, so we have a bit of time to prepare ourselves,” he said, adding that this meant ramping up investments into the defence industry.

Photographs have emerged showing the aftermath of a Russian missile attack on Kharkiv, as at least 10 people were injured.

The Kremlin has claimed not to be particularly familiar with the views on Russia of Calin Georgescu, the far-right Romanian presidential candidate who has emerged as the shock winner in the first round of the country’s elections.

The success of Mr Georgescu, a little-known independent candidate who has claimed that Romania’s best chance lies with “Russian wisdom” and who won 22.9 per cent of the first round vote, has surprised both pollsters and commentators alike.

Given his anti-Nato stance, one political commentator told Reuters that Russian meddling could not be ruled out. “Based on Georgescu’s stance towards Ukraine and the discrepancy between opinion surveys and the actual result, we cannot rule [that] out,” said Sergiu Miscoiu, a political scientist at Babes-Bolyai University.

But asked on Monday for the Kremlin’s take on Mr Georgescu and his electoral prospects ahead of the second round of voting on 8 December, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters: “I would not make any predictions yet.

“We probably cannot say that we are that familiar with the world view of this candidate as far as relations with our country are concerned. For now, we understand very clearly the current leadership of Romania, which is not a friendly country to us. We will of course watch how the electoral processes develop and who wins.”

The Ukrainian military has said it had struck an oil depot overnight in a reported drone attack in Russia’s western Kaluga region, whose capital lies just 100 miles southwest of Moscow.

The military also said it had struck “a number of important targets” overnight in Russia’s Bryansk and Kursk regions, which are adjacent to Ukraine.

Unverified footage appearing to show the aftermath was shared online, including by a Ukrainian ministerial adviser.

Romania’s political landscape is reeling after an obscure far-right populist secured the first round in its presidential election, beating the incumbent prime minister and threatening Romania’s pro-Ukraine stance.

Calin Georgescu, a hard-right critic of Nato who ran independently, will face off against reformist Elena Lasconi in a runoff in two weeks, after securing 22.95 per cent of the vote to her 19.17 per cent.

Ms Lasconi beat incument premier Marcel Ciolacu of the Social Democratic Party, marking the first time in Romania’s 35-year post-communist history for the party not to have a candidate in the second round of a presidential race.

Ukraine’s air force claims to have shot down 71 out of 145 drones launched by Russia overnight, in what would mark one of the largest such attacks of the war so far.

The air force said that it had lost track of 71 more drones likely due to active electronic warfare, with one drone heading towards Belarus.

The latest attack would be on a par with a drone attack earlier this month described as Russia’s largest of the war so far by Kyiv, which also saw Russia use 145 drones to attack Ukraine, a significant number of which will be decoys and others Iranian-made Shahed attack drones.

The Kremlin has said that US president-elect Donald Trump’s circle speaks of peace in Ukraine, while the current Biden Administration – which supports Ukraine in its fight against Russia’s invasion – does not.

Repeating rhetoric regularly deployed by Russia throughout its war on Ukraine, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov claimed on Monday that Vladimir Putin had repeatedly said that Moscow was ready for dialogue over Ukraine.

Mr Trump is “very concerned” about an escalation in fighting between Russia and Ukraine, Trump’s pick for national security adviser, Mike Waltz, told Fox News on Sunday, saying the war must be brought “to a responsible end”.

At least 10 people have been injured in a Russian attack on Ukraine’s northeastern city of Kharkiv, its mayor has said.

The Kharkiv regional governor, Oleh Syniehubov, said the attack caused a fire on one of the city’s central streets and damaged civilian infrastructure and cars.

Russian forces have launch overnight attacks on energy infrastructure in Ukraine’s southern Mykolaiv region and on industrial facilities in Zaporizhzhia, authorities have said.

Mykolaiv governor Vitaliy Kim said there had been no casualties and engineers had restored power to most of the consumers facing power cuts after air defence’s downed two drones over the region.

Russia also launched “tens of drones” to attack Zaporizhzhia overnight, regional governor Ivan Fedorov said on national television.

The attack injured one child and dealt damage to multiple industrial facilities and a residential block.

Air defences also repelled a drone attack on the Ukrainian capital and the surrounding region overnight. Authorities reported no casualties or significant damage in the attack’s aftermath.

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Sunday that Russia has used around 460 drones and over 20 missiles to attack Ukraine in the past week.