WASHINGTON/BERLIN/KYIV
Ukraine declared an air raid alert over the whole country early on Thursday and senior officials said air defences units were shooting down incoming Russian missiles, while fighting also intensified in Bakhmut in the east.
The attacks come after the United States and Germany announced plans to arm Ukraine with dozens of modern battle tanks in its fight against Russia, which denounced the decisions as an “extremely dangerous” step.
“The first Russian missiles have been shot down,” Andriy Yermak, head of President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s office said.
Overnight, the military said its anti-aircraft defences had shot down all 24 drones sent by Russia, 15 around the capital, Kyiv. There were no reports of damage.
Officials told the public to take shelter.
Russia has targeted critical infrastructure with missile and drone strikes since October, causing sweeping blackouts and other outages during the bitter winter.
Earlier, Zelenskiy praised the US and German commitments to send tanks and urged allies to provide large quantities of tanks quickly.
“The key now is speed and volumes. Speed in training our forces, speed in supplying tanks to Ukraine. The numbers in tank support,” he said in a nightly video address on Wednesday. “We have to form such a ‘tank fist’, such a ‘fist of freedom’.”
Ukraine has been seeking hundreds of modern tanks to give its troops the firepower to break Russian defensive lines and reclaim occupied territory in the south and east. Ukraine and Russia have been relying primarily on Soviet-era T-72 tanks.
The promise of tanks comes as both Ukraine and Russia are expected to launch new offensives in the war.
US President Joe Biden announced his decision to supply 31 M1 Abrams tanks hours after Berlin said it would provide Leopard 2 tanks — the workhorse of NATO armies across Europe.
Maintaining Kyiv’s drumbeat of requests for more aid, Zelenskiy said he spoke to NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg and called for long-range missiles and aircraft.
Ukraine’s allies have already provided billions in military support including sophisticated US missile systems.
The United States has been wary of deploying the difficult-to-maintain Abrams but had to change tack to persuade Germany to send to Ukraine its more easily operated Leopards.
Biden said the tanks pose “no offensive threat” to Russia and that they were needed to help the Ukrainians “improve their ability to manoeuvre in open terrain”.
Germany will send an initial company of 14 tanks from its stocks and approve shipments by allied European states.
The Abrams can be tricky, but the Leopard was designed as a system that any NATO member could service and crews and repair specialists could be trained together on a single model, Ukrainian military expert Viktor Kevlyuk told Espreso TV.
“If we have been brought into this club by providing us with these vehicles, I would say our prospects look good.”
