Blasts shake key Ukraine cities as Poland scrambles air force after Russian missile attack

Explosions shook Ukraine’s capital Kyiv and other cities while neighbouring Poland scrambled its air force early on Sunday after the two countries said a Russian missile attack was under way.

“Due to the massive attack by the Russian Federation using cruise missiles, ballistic missiles, and unmanned aerial vehicles on objects located, among others, in western Ukraine, Polish and allied aircraft have started operating in our airspace,” the operational command of Nato member Poland’s armed forces posted on the social media platform X.

It said it had “activated all available forces and resources at his disposal, the on-duty fighter pairs were scrambled, and the ground-based air defence and radar reconnaissance systems reached the highest state of readiness”.

Blasts were heard in Ukraine’s southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia and the Black Sea port of Odesa, Reuters witnesses said, and Ukraine’s air force issued air raid alerts for all of the country, although the scale of the attack was unclear.

Local authorities and Ukrainian media also reported explosions in the city of Mykolaiv in the south and Chernihiv in the north.

The air force urged residents to take cover and said several missiles, including different types of cruise missiles, were flying through Ukrainian air space.