Russia fired nearly 700 drones and dozens of ballistic and cruise missiles at Ukrainian cities in an hourslong bombardment that stretched from daytime into the night on Thursday, killing at least 16 people and injuring more than 80, Ukrainian officials said. It was Moscow's biggest aerial assault in almost two weeks.

The barrage struck residential districts in Kyiv, the southern port of Odesa, the central Dnipro region and the southern city of Zaporizhzhia, and came as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy lobbied European capitals for more air defense systems and pressed Washington not to ease sanctions on Russia. The Guardian, citing local officials, put the confirmed toll at 12 as of Thursday morning; Ukrainian authorities cited by The Associated Press later raised it to at least 16 as rescuers worked through collapsed buildings.

In the capital

Four people were killed in Kyiv, including a 12-year-old, and more than 50 were injured, authorities said. Rescuers in the capital's Podilsky district pulled a child from the rubble of a collapsed residential building, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said, and a fire broke out in the Obolonsky district where missile debris fell and cars ignited. The strikes damaged 17 apartment buildings, 10 private homes, a hotel, an office center, a car dealership, a gas station and a shopping mall in the capital, officials said.

Nine people were killed and 23 injured in Odesa, three women were killed and about three dozen injured in the Dnipro region, and one person died in Zaporizhzhia, Ukrainian authorities said. A drone strike on Kharkiv in the northeast wounded a 77-year-old woman and a 66-year-old man, regional military administration chief Oleh Syniehubov said. Ukraine's air force said it shot down or disabled 667 of 703 incoming targets, including 636 Shahed-type drones, and that 20 strike drones and 12 missiles hit 26 locations.

Zelenskyy's appeal

"Another night has proven that Russia does not deserve any easing of global policy or lifting of sanctions," Zelenskyy said on X, thanking Germany, Norway and Italy for new air defense agreements reached during his 48-hour trip this week. He said he had instructed the commander of the air force to contact partners who had earlier committed to providing missiles for Patriot and other systems but had not delivered.

The other side

Russia's Defense Ministry made no comment on the Ukrainian casualty figures but said its air defenses downed 207 Ukrainian drones overnight. Krasnodar regional Governor Veniamin Kondratyev said a 14-year-old girl and a woman were killed in Ukrainian strikes on the Black Sea port of Tuapse, which he said damaged six apartment buildings, 24 private houses and three schools. The Fox News account framed the bombardment as an escalation during ongoing peace negotiations; the Guardian focused on the civilian toll and described Moscow as having recently expanded daytime strikes. Neither account included a direct Kremlin response to Thursday's attack.

Kyiv is pushing allies to speed disbursement of a 90-billion-euro European Union loan that Hungary has blocked, and has argued against a U.S. temporary waiver on Russian oil sanctions that Ukraine says is helping finance the Kremlin's war. "Such attacks cannot be normalized," Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said on X. "These are war crimes that must be stopped and their perpetrators held to account."