Russian drones knock out Ukrainian power facilities near Kyiv

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KYIV (Reuters) -Russia attacked Ukrainian energy facilities in two regions between the capital Kyiv and the Russian border with drones overnight, leaving tens of thousands of people without power, Ukraine’s national power grid operator said on Friday.

The governor of one of the regions, Chernihiv, told the national television at least 15 people were wounded and some infrastructure and a dormitory were damaged during an attack on the town of Nizhyn, without giving more details.

More than 68,000 consumers in certain districts of Zhytomyr and Kyiv regions lost power, Ukrenergo said. In the morning, about 30,000 consumers were still without power after what were the latest of near daily Russian attacks on the power system since the spring.

Overall, Ukrainian air defences destroyed 20 out of 22 Russian attack drones launched overnight, Ukraine’s air force chief said. Most of the drones were shot down in the southern Kherson and northeastern Sumy regions, along with the two in the north.

The emergency service said an overnight attack on Kherson had damaged six residential buildings and caused significant fires in open areas.

Russia has attacked energy facilities across Ukraine with missiles and drones over the past few months, causing blackouts in many regions and forcing Kyiv to start large-scale electricity imports from the European Union.

(Reporting by Pavel Polityuk; Editing by Himani Sarkar and Philippa Fletcher)