Russia targeted the Ukrainian capital with ballistic missiles early on August 1 as President Volodymyr Zelenskyy pressed Washington to grant licenses for Kyiv to produce its own Patriot air defense missiles amid apparent renewed reluctance by US President Donald Trump.
Emergency services in Kyiv said at least nine people were killed and dozens of others injured, including at least four children, in a Russian missile strike, adding that several people were trapped inside a partially collapsed building in the capital.
"Explosions in the city. Kyiv under ballistic attack. Stay under cover!" Kyiv Mayor Vitaliy Klitschko wrote on Telegram as the attacks struck.
Local authorities reported damage to residential buildings, a school, and the Lithuanian Embassy after more than a dozen explosions were heard across the city in the early morning hours.
Having made little to no territorial gains along Ukraine's more than 1,200-kilometer front line this year, Moscow has stepped up its missile attacks on Ukraine as country faces severe shortages of air defense systems capable of intercepting high-speed ballistic missiles.
Zelenskyy's Pleas
Over the past weeks, Zelenskyy has issued repeated calls for Western allies to send additional military aid and urged Washington to follow through on its vow to make licenses available for Ukraine to produce Patriot air defense systems.
On July 9, the Ukrainian president said Kyiv and Washington had reached agreement on licenses for production of PAC-3 Patriot interceptors, adding that parts for the missiles were expected to arrive in the next few days.
However, Trump on July 31 downplayed earlier suggestions that Washington was ready to grant Kyiv a license to produce Patriot missiles itself.
"These weapons are incredible. We have to be very careful about letting somebody build them," Trump told reporters at a Cabinet meeting at Camp David, adding that his administration has "not agreed" to that yet.
"We're talking about it. But it's a hard thing to give away that kind of technology," he said.
Trump's latest comments came as Zelenskyy returned to Kyiv from Washington, where the two leaders had discussed the possibility during what was described as a "good" meeting at the White House.
Writing on Telegram on July 31 after a phone call with US Vice President JD Vance, Zelenskyy said that "as Russia's air attacks on our country continue unabated, air defense -- specifically Patriot interceptors against ballistic missiles -- remains a top priority."
The latest attacks on Kyiv come after devastating Russian strikes elsewhere in Ukraine.
Reporting from the village of Radushne in Ukraine's Dnipropetrovsk region on July 31, RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service captured local residents mourning members of a family that had been almost entirely wiped out by a stunning Russian missile attack the previous day.
"This is an enormous tragedy for all of us, for our entire community," a neighbor of the family named Luchia said, as six of the family's 10 members were killed when the missile destroyed their home.
Ukraine Responds With Strikes Inside Russia
With the Kremlin sticking to its hard-line position, demanding full control over Ukraine's key eastern Donetsk region to end its invasion, Kyiv has sought in recent months to counter Russian military pressure by stepping up its own long-range strikes on targets deep inside Russia.
On August 1, Ukrainian forces has struck infrastructure of three oil refineries in Russia's Bashkortostan region, almost 1,600 kilometers from the battlefield, Zelenskyy said, adding that "these refineries process millions of tons of oil each year."
Separately, Ukraine has continued to attack facilities belonging to Russia's largest online retailer, Wildberries. On July 31, regional officials and monitoring channels on Telegram reporting such strikes in at least two regions.
The retailer said the strikes sparked a fire at its warehouse in the Volgograd region, reporting no injuries following the attack. Another attack on a Wildberries facility was reported in Zelenodolsk in Russia's oil-rich Republic of Tatarstan.
Ukraine has accused Wildberries of supporting Russia's military logistics and selling dual-use goods, fueling Moscow's war effort. The allegations were denied by Moscow.
Amid the latest strikes on the retailer, the company's founder and CEO, Tatyana Kim, said the Ukrainian drone attacks amounted to "acts of terrorism" against civilians and affected millions of people in Russia and other countries.
Kim claimed that the company was no different from major global e-commerce platforms such as Amazon or Alibaba.
In recent weeks, Ukrainian forces have struck at least a dozen Wildberries warehouses across multiple Russian regions.
The White House has increasingly sought a negotiated solution to end the war in Ukraine since early 2025, when Trump took office. However, despite a number of meetings held over the past year, Kyiv and Moscow remain far apart in their negotiating terms.
