Overnight Russia strikes hit Ukraine power plant, leaving residents in freezing cold

Russian drone strikes have damaged a thermal power plant in Mykolaiv in southern Ukraine overnight, leaving 46,000 consumers without heating as temperatures plunge below freezing, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said on Sunday.

“This was done deliberately to leave people without heat in sub-zero temperatures and create a humanitarian catastrophe,” Shmyhal said on the Telegram messenger app.

 Russian forces hit Ukrainian military airfields, a drone assembly workshop and an energy facility over the past day, the Russian Defense Ministry said.

"Tactical aviation, attack drones, rocket forces and artillery of Russian battlegroups struck the infrastructure of military airfields, a drone assembly workshop, an energy facility that supplies Ukrainian defense enterprises, as well as clusters of enemy manpower and equipment in 141 areas," it said.

Russian air defenses shot down two HIMARS projectiles and 50 fixed-wing drones over the past day, the ministry added.

"Air defense capabilities shot down two rockets, fired with a US-made HIMARS multiple launch rocket system, and 50 unmanned fixed-wing drones," it said.