President Emmanuel Macron has pledged to send interceptor missiles to Ukraine, as the country’s air-defence capabilities come under mounting strain following another wave of deadly Russian attacks.
“It is crucial to provide Ukraine with all the necessary means to defend its skies and thwart this aggression,” Mr Macron said in a post on X. He added that, during a telephone conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, he had outlined “the strengthening of our support with the delivery of interceptors and the continuation of our cooperation”.
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France agreed in June to let Ukraine manufacture French-designed cruise missiles, glide bombs and air-defence interceptors. The deal marked the first time Paris had licensed production of its weapons on Ukrainian territory.
In July, France also announced that it would supply additional defence and missile systems manufactured by the country.
The SAMP-T air-defence system, which France has also agreed to provide to Ukraine, alongside the Aster 30 interceptor missiles used by the system
Russian strikes killed at least two people in Ukraine this morning, local officials said, just one day after a deadly attack on a crowded shopping centre.
The Kyiv City Military Administration said a warehouse was on fire in the capital’s Darnytskyi district after authorities issued a warning of a ballistic-missile threat.
“According to preliminary information, unfortunately, there is one person dead and several injured,” the administration said in a statement on Telegram.
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In the southern city of Zaporizhzhia, a Russian drone strike killed a man and injured four others, according to Ivan Fedorov, head of the regional military administration.
The latest attacks followed a barrage of Russian strikes that killed at least 20 people across Ukraine yesterday. Sixteen of those victims died in a daytime drone attack on a busy shopping centre in Kryvyi Rih, the hometown of President Volodymyr Zelensky.
A man surveys a shopping centre damaged by a Russian drone strike in Kryvyi Rih, Ukraine
Rescue teams worked through the night, regional military governor Oleksandr Ganzha said, adding that nine people remained missing, including two children.
Emergency services said 130 people were injured in the attack, among them 23 children.
The United Nations said Ukraine’s civilian death toll so far this year had reached its highest level since the opening months of the war.
Kyiv has repeatedly urged its allies to provide more assistance as Russia intensifies its attacks. Ukrainian forces have faced particular difficulty intercepting barrages of ballistic missiles.
Ukraine, meanwhile, has increased its retaliatory strikes inside Russia in recent months, partly in an effort to push Moscow towards negotiations aimed at ending Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War II.
Diplomatic initiatives have so far failed to bring the two sides closer to an agreement. Russia continues to demand sweeping territorial and political concessions from Kyiv.
Mr Zelensky has rejected those demands, saying they would amount to an effective capitulation and leave Ukraine vulnerable to another Russian assault.
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