At least three people died in western and southern Ukraine and five were injured in its central part, following a major offensive launched early Monday morning by Russia across much of the country, according to Ukrainian officials.

More than half of Ukraine’s regions were hit by a large-scale Russian attack with at least 200 missiles and drones early this morning, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denis Smikhal said.

“Today 15 regions were hit by a massive Russian attack. The enemy used various types of weapons: drones, cruise missiles and Kinzhals (supersonic missiles). There are injured and dead”says the Ukrainian Prime Minister in his Telegram post.

From the Russian attacks energy facilities were affected in at least 3 Ukrainian regions, regional officials announced at the same time.

The authorities of Zaporizhia, Rivne and Lviv regions reported in Telegram posts that energy facilities in their regions were attacked.

Local officials in other regions also reported that energy facilities and critical infrastructure in their regions were targeted.

Three dead and five injured

In their Telegram posts, the governors of Dnipropetrovsk, in southeast Ukraine, and Zaporizhia, in the south, as well as the mayor of Lutsk, in the northwest part of the country, said they had one person each dead in their areas.

“The provisional count speaks of one dead, it is a 69-year-old man,” noted Sergey Lysak, the head of the Dnipropetrovsk regional administration.

“In the morning, the invader attacked the district en masse. Explosions were heard in the regions of Dnipro and Krivi Rig”two major mining towns, he noted.

further south, “The Russians killed a civilian in the Zaporizhia region,” said Ivan Fedoro, head of the Zaporizhia regional administration. “The enemy struck near a private residence,” noted.

In the city of Lutsk, where an important air base is located, “apartment building was damaged”, announced the mayor of Igor Polischuk, clarifying that a man lost his life there.

Explosions were also heard this morning over the Ukrainian capital, according to AFP reporters.

Small clouds of smoke caused by anti-aircraft defense systems could be seen in the sky of Kiev, while a cloud of black smoke could be seen over the eastern part of the Ukrainian capital, according to journalists.

“Please remain calm in shelters,” Kyiv municipal authorities reported on their Telegram account.

The Ukrainian energy company DTEK also announced damage to the power supply network.

“Technicians are working to restore power,” the municipal authorities of Kyiv clarified in their announcement.

Earlier today the mayor of Kyiv Vitali Klitschko reported in a Telegram post that there were power and water outages in parts of Kyiv, while DTEK had announced emergency power outages following the attacks.

Russia frequently launches airstrikes in Ukraine, some of which target the country’s energy infrastructure, knocking out power to millions of Ukrainians.

Today’s attack also targeted the installations of the Lviv region’s electricity network in the western part of the country.

“As a result there are partial power outages in Lviv and its surroundings,” its regional governor Maksim Kozytsky noted in a post on Telegram.

Earlier, an attack on an industrial facility in the central Poltava region left five people injured, according to regional governor Filip Pronin.

Kiev is calling on its allies to allow long-range strikes on Russia

Following this massive Russian offensive in Ukraine, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky made another appeal to Western partners to step up their aid after the Russians launched what he described as “one of the biggest attacks – a combined strike, which includes over a hundred missiles of various types and about a hundred ‘Shaheds”.

“Across Ukraine, we could do much more to protect lives if the air force of our European neighbors worked in coordination with our F-16s and air defense systems. If such unity has proven to be effective in the Middle East, it must also work in Europe,” the Ukrainian leader stressed.

“Ukraine cannot be limited in its long-term capabilities when terrorists face no such limitations,” he said, adding: “America, Britain, France and our other partners have the power to help us stop this terror. The time for decisive action is now.”

Andrii Yermak, the chief of staff of the Ukrainian president, called on Kiev’s allies to allow Ukraine to launch long-range attacks on Russia with weapons that Ukraine has acquired from the West.

“A decision of this kind will hasten the end of Russian terrorism,” Germak noted in a post on Telegram.