By Tara Subramaniam, Sophie Tanno and Ed Upright, CNN
From CNN’s Olga Voitovych and Jo Shelley
The death toll from Wednesday afternoon’s Russian missile attacks has risen to 10, Ukraine’s prosecutor general said on national TV.
“Eight energy facilities were hit yesterday. Unfortunately, there is confirmed information about 10 dead and about 50 wounded civilians,” Andrii Kostin said.
From CNN’s Olga Voitovych and Jo Shelley
The water supply has been returned to every district in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, mayor Vitalii Klitschko said on Telegram Thursday.
“Water supply has been restored in all districts of the capital,” he said. “But it will take some time for the water supply system to work at full capacity.”
Currently, some consumers may still have low water pressure in the system, especially those Kyiv residents who live on the upper floors of high-rise buildings,” Klitschko said.
Water in Kyiv was suspended Wednesday after shelling in the region, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said in a post on Telegram.
Klitschko asked residents to “stock up on water” while experts tried to “return water to the homes of Kyiv residents.”
The Kyiv regional administration said Wednesday the entire Kyiv region – meaning millions of people – was completely without electricity and water was also badly disrupted after Russian missiles targeted critical infrastructure.
From CNN's Antonia Mortensen and Sarah Dean
Poland’s defence minister Mariusz Blaszczak said Wednesday the Patriot missile defense system that Germany offered Poland should go to Ukraine instead.
“After further missile attacks (from Russia), I turned to (Germany) to have the proposed (Poland) Patriot batteries transferred to (Ukraine) and deployed at the western border,” Blaszczak said on Twitter.
“This will protect (Ukraine) from further victims and blackout and will increase security at our eastern border.”
Ukraine’s ambassador to Warsaw, Vasyl Zvarych, responded by thanking him on Twitter and added: "We need as many modern anti-missile systems as possible to keep the sky above Ukraine safe. Successful defense of (Ukraine) against Russia is a contribution to the security of Poland and the whole of Europe, because Russian terror does not respect borders.”
Germany’s offer to Poland came after a missile hit Polish territory and killed two people near the Ukrainian border on November 15. The leaders of Poland and NATO said that projectile was likely fired by Ukrainian forces defending their country against Russian strikes, and that the incident appeared to be an accident.
A longtime mainstay of US military operations: The Patriot air defense missile system – Patriot stands for “Phased Array Tracking Radar to Intercept of Target” – is designed to counter and destroy incoming short-range ballistic missiles, advanced aircraft and cruise missiles.
The battery includes missiles and launching stations, a radar set that detects and tracks targets, and an engagement control station, according to the Missile Defense Advocacy Alliance.
The Patriot missile system has undergone several improvements and upgrades since it was first deployed in 1982.
Its first combat use was in the Gulf War, which was also the first time that an air defense system destroyed a hostile tactical ballistic missile.
Read more on Patriot missile defense systems here.
CNN's Veronica Stracqualursi contributed to this post.
From CNN's Allegra Goodwin
The European Union is preparing a ninth package of sanctions against Russia following Moscow’s latest barrage of strikes on Ukraine, President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen said Thursday.
“We are working hard to hit Russia where it hurts to blunt even further its capacity to wage war on Ukraine and I can announce today that we are working full speed on a ninth sanctions package,” von der Leyen told a news conference in Espoo, Finland.
Von der Leyen added she was “confident that we will very soon approve a global price cap on Russian oil with the G7 and other major partners,” after the West’s biggest economies agreed in September to impose a cap to reduce Moscow’s ability to fund its war.
“We will not rest until Ukraine has prevailed over Putin and his unlawful and barbaric war," she continued.
Western sanctions are taking their toll on Russia, particularly as the cold winter months begin.
“The mood in Moscow and the country is now extremely gloomy, quiet, intimidated, and hopeless,” 34-year-old Lisa, who declined to give her last name and said she was a film producer, told CNN.
“The planning horizon is as low as ever. People have no idea what might happen tomorrow or in a year," she added.
While the shelves in most stores remain well stocked, Western products are becoming increasingly scarce and very expensive, further driving prices that are already hammering many Russian households.
Familiar goods disappear, starting from toilet paper and Coca-Cola, ending with clothes,” Lisa said.
Western sanctions have also sharply curtailed Russia’s ability to replenish the munitions it is using in Ukraine, according to analysis from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence last month.
Read more on the mood in Moscow here.
CNN's Frederik Pleitgen, Claudia Otto and Ana Archen contributed to this post.
From CNN’s Olga Voitovych and Jo Shelley
The barrage of Russian air strikes against Ukraine’s energy infrastructure Wednesday caused a “blackout” in the country's power system, its energy minister told national television. It was the first time that all four of Ukraine’s nuclear plants were shut down at the same time, he said.
”We must understand the key thing: yesterday, as a result of shelling, there was a blackout in our power system,” Herman Halushchenko said Thursday.
“The situation is very difficult but, at 4 a.m., we managed to unite the power system. It is now working as a single unit and critical infrastructure facilities throughout the country have been powered.”
The authorities are now racing to restore electricity across the country.
“We will increase the volume of power being generated during the day,” Halushchenko said. “We expect that by the evening nuclear power plants will start working and supplying electricity to the grid. This will significantly reduce the deficit.”
Ukraine is heavily dependent on nuclear energy, according to the World Nuclear Association. It has 15 reactors at four plants that, before Russia’s invasion in February, generated about half of its electricity.
Yesterday was “the first time that all four nuclear power plants were simultaneously shut down,” Halushchenko said.
Now all nuclear facilities – apart from the besieged plant in Zaporizhzhia, the largest in Ukraine – have been reconnected to the Ukrainian grid and will start to supply it with electricity today.
“If there is no new shelling, by the end of the day we will be able to significantly reduce the deficit in the power system due to nuclear generation and, accordingly, this will make it possible to proceed to scheduled outages,” the minister added.
From CNN's Olga Voitovych and Jo Shelley
One in four houses in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv are without power following Russian shelling in the region, city authorities said on Telegram.
Twenty-five per cent of the city's housing stock remains without power supply, and in emergency mode,” the post read.
Water supply has been restored on the east bank of the Dnipro river that runs through the city and the administration expects to restore it on the west bank this morning.
From CNN's Josh Pennington
Nearly 3,000 miners have been rescued in Ukraine after power outages caused by Russian strikes on the country's energy infrastructure left them trapped underground overnight.
Rescue efforts at mines in the central Dnipropetrovsk region concluded in the early hours of this morning, Oleksandr Vilkul, head of the Kryvyi Rih city military administration, said in a Telegram post.
Regional head Valentyn Reznichenko said "rescue teams were able to extract nearly 3,000 miners to the surface." It was a "tense" night in Dnipropetrovsk, he added.
Reznichenko said half of the region's households have had power restored but "blackouts will continue to minimize the load on the power grid."
Some context: A series of Russian airstrikes against Ukraine on Wednesday destroyed critical facilities, including energy infrastructure, housing, and a hospital maternity ward, where a newborn baby was killed. The large-scale assault also led to widespread blackouts in Ukraine and neighboring Moldova.
From CNN's Vasco Cotovio, Sam Kiley, Peter Rudden and Olha Konovalova
Two Russian soldiers walked down a street in Kherson on a spring evening in early March, just days after Moscow captured the city. The temperature that night was still below freezing and the power was out, leaving the city in complete darkness as the soldiers made their way back to camp after a few drinks.
As one stumbled on, the other stopped to relieve himself on the side of the pavement. Suddenly, a knife was thrust deep into the right side of his neck.
He fell to the grass. Moments later, the second Russian soldier, inebriated and unaware, met the same fate.
“I finished the first one immediately and then I caught up with the other and killed him on the spot,” says Archie, a Ukrainian resistance fighter who described the scene above to CNN.
He says he moved on pure instinct.
“I saw the orcs in uniform and I thought, why not?,” Archie adds, using a derogative term for Russians, as he walks through that same street. “There were no people or light and I seized the moment.”
The 20-year-old is a trained mixed martial arts fighter, with nimble feet and sharp reflexes, who had previously always carried a knife for self-defense, but never killed anyone. CNN is referring to him by his call sign to protect his identity.
“Adrenaline played its role. I didn’t have any fear or time to think,” he says. “For the first few days I felt very bad, but then I realized that they were my enemies. They came to my home to take it from me.”
Read more here.
From CNN's Pierre Bairin in Paris
French President Emmanuel Macron on Wednesday denounced Russian attacks on civilian infrastructure in Ukraine and said the acts "cannot go unpunished."
“Ukraine suffered massive shelling today, leaving much of the country without water or electricity. Strikes against civilian infrastructures are war crimes and cannot go unpunished,” Macron posted on Twitter.
A series of Russian airstrikes against Ukraine on Wednesday destroyed critical facilities, including energy infrastructure, housing, and a hospital maternity ward, where a newborn baby was killed. The large-scale assault also led to widespread blackouts in Ukraine and neighboring Moldova.
France plans to hold a donor conference in Paris next month in support of Ukraine and its southwestern neighbor, Macron said.
“With winter approaching, we will mobilize international support for Ukraine on December 13 to help that country remain resilient and to guarantee its energy access. We will not forget Moldova, which was also affected by water and electricity cuts,” Macron tweeted.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky earlier on Wednesday urged the UN Security Council to support the proposed Ukrainian peace formula following the airstrikes, which he dubbed "the Russian formula of terror."
