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Russian drone slams into block of flats in deadly wave of strikes across Kyiv
At least four people were killed when a Russian drone penetrated an apartment block in eastern Kyiv, during a wave of strikes throughout the Ukrainian capital.
Condemning the attacks as vile and calculated, President Volodymyr Zelensky said about 430 drones and 18 missiles had been launched and dozens of high-rise buildings damaged.
As emergency workers sifted through the wreckage of the block of flats in the Lisovyi area, one Kyiv resident called Vita described how the drone had pierced the building, exploding on the other side.
Several other regions were also targeted. A drone attack on a market at Chornomorsk in the south of the country killed two people.
The Russian Black Sea port of Novorossiysk was hit in an overnight Ukrainian attack. Fire broke out at the major Sheskharis oil refinery, and a ship and apartment blocks were hit, officials said.
Krasnodar governor Veniamin Kondratyev said three crew members and another man were hurt in the attack which damaged the main oil depot and a container terminal.
President Zelensky said Ukraine had fired long-range “Long Neptune” cruise missiles during its attacks on Russia overnight, without specifying what they targeted.
Mayor Andrei Kravchenko has declared a state of emergency and Reuters reports that oil exports have been halted.
In Kyiv, residential buildings came under attack “in practically every district”, the head of the city’s military administration Tymur Tkachenko said on Telegram.
He issued a warning to take shelter a minute after midnight local time on Thursday night, writing “it’s loud in Kyiv”.
The fire service in the Lisovyi neighbourhood on Kyiv’s left bank said later the drone had hit the seventh floor of an apartment block. When it exploded all the floors – from the eighth down to the fourth – collapsed, a spokesman told the BBC.
Vita said she saw all four bodies being pulled out of the apartment a few doors down from hers: “I saw it with my own eyes.”
Two cranes hoisted emergency workers outside the block, as crews combed through the destroyed building, throwing broken sections of wall and shattered glass to the ground.
Falling debris and fires damaged multiple high-rise apartment buildings, a hospital, school and administrative buildings, according to emergency services.
More than 40 people were rescued, they added, including 14 from a fire in a residential building. Another person was rescued after being pulled from beneath rubble, they said.
Kyiv’s energy infrastructure was badly hit, leaving some buildings in the capital without heat, officials said.
“The attack was massive, with drones, with ballistic [missiles], with lots of air defence working,” Ukrainian MP Lisa Yasko told the BBC. “Very often there was the feeling that your bed was just shaking together with the windows.”
Medical teams were deployed to all fires, officials said, while Mayor Vitali Klitschko said nine people were being treated in hospital with one man in an “extremely serious condition”.
Ukraine’s air force warned drones and guided bombs had been targeting several other regions, including Sumy.
The overnight strikes follow the deaths of six people in another Russian offensive less than a week ago that also damaged residential buildings and energy infrastructure.
Russia says its attacks on energy targets, now a familiar part of the war, are aimed at the Ukrainian military, although Kyiv has long rejected that claim.
President Zelensky has called for “no exceptions” to Western sanctions on Russian energy – although shortly after the US granted Hungary one such exemption.
US President Donald Trump had initially announced the sanctions on Russian oil after saying ceasefire talks with Russian President Vladimir were not progressing.
[BBC]
US President Donald Trump has filed a $5bn (£3.7bn) lawsuit against the BBC over an edit of his 6 January 2021 speech in a Panorama documentary.
Trump accused the broadcaster of defamation and of violating a trade practices law, according to court documents filed in Florida.
The BBC apologised to Trump last month, but rejected his demands for compensation and disagreed there was any “basis for a defamation claim”.
Trump’s legal team accused the BBC of defaming him by “intentionally, maliciously, and deceptively doctoring his speech”. The BBC has not yet responded to the lawsuit.
Trump said last month that he planned to sue the BBC for the documentary, which aired in the UK ahead of the 2024 US election.
“I think I have to do it,” Trump told reporters of his plans. “They cheated. They changed the words coming out of my mouth.”
In his speech on 6 January 2021, before a riot at the US Capitol, Trump told a crowd: “We’re going to walk down to the Capitol, and we’re going to cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women.”
More than 50 minutes later in the speech, he said: “And we fight. We fight like hell.”
In the Panorama programme, a clip showed him as saying: “We’re going to walk down to the Capitol… and I’ll be there with you. And we fight. We fight like hell.”
The BBC acknowledged that the edit had given “the mistaken impression” he had “made a direct call for violent action”, but disagreed that there was basis for a defamation claim.
In November, a leaked internal BBC memo criticised how the speech was edited, and led to the resignations of the BBC’s director general, Tim Davie, and its head of news, Deborah Turness.
Before Trump filed the lawsuit, lawyers for the BBC had given a lengthy response to the president’s claims.
They said there was no malice in the edit and that Trump was not harmed by the programme, as he was re-elected shortly after it aired.
They also said the BBC did not have the rights to, and did not, distribute the Panorama programme on its US channels. While the documentary was available on BBC iPlayer, it was restricted to viewers in the UK.
In his lawsuit, Trump cites agreements the BBC had with other distributors to show content, specifically one with a third-party media corporation that allegedly had licensing rights to the documentary outside the UK. The BBC has not responded to these claims, nor has the corporation with the alleged distribution agreement.
The suit also claims that people in Florida may have accessed the programme using a VPN or by using streaming service BritBox.
“The Panorama Documentary’s publicity, coupled with significant increases in VPN usage in Florida since its debut, establishes the immense likelihood that citizens of Florida accessed the Documentary before the BBC had it removed,” the lawsuit said
(BBC)
The Situation Report issued by the Disaster Management Center at 06:00AM on 16th December 2025 shows that 70,297 persons belonging to 22,338 house holds are still being housed at 731 safety centers established by the government.
The number of deaths due to the recent disastrous weather stands at 643 while 183 persons are missing.
Latest News
Bondi Beach gunmen who killed 15 after targeting Jewish celebration were father and son, police say
New South Wales Police say 15 people, including a 10 year old girl were killed in a shooting at Bondi Beach on Sunday – their ages range from 10 to 87
The attack happened while an event was being held to mark the start of Hanukkah – police say they’re treating it as a terror incident
The two gunmen were father and son, police say. The 50-year-old man also died at the scene while the 24-year-old remains in hospital in critical condition
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese calls the attack “an act of pure evil” that “deliberately targeted” the Jewish community
(BBC)
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