Vladimir Putin celebrates 74th birthday with deadly strikes on Kyiv, leaving at least 19 dead

Russian missiles and drones pounded Kyiv and a dozen other Ukrainian regions overnight into Wednesday, killing at least 19 civilians, including four children, and wounding around 60 in Moscow’s latest devastating barrage, Ukrainian officials said.Ukraine had anticipated the attack, with President Volodymyr Zelensky warning the previous day that intelligence services had concluded that Russia was building up for a “massive” strike.Although Ukraine knew about the looming attack, which coincided with Russian President Vladimir Putin’s 74th birthday, it couldn’t fend it off completely.The deaths and damage illustrated the difficulty Ukraine has in countering Russia’s ballistic missiles and the new jet-powered drones used in Moscow’s escalating bombardments.Without ammunition for its US-made Patriot air defense systems, Ukraine can’t stop Russian ballistic weapons.

It is racing to develop a new generation of interceptors fast enough to catch Moscow’s high-flying jet-propelled drones.Russia and Ukraine are engaged in a long-range aerial war as their armies remain largely deadlocked on the battlefield, more than 4 ½ years after Moscow’s all-out invasion of its neighbor.The unrelenting aerial attacks are hurting Russia but could be ruinous for smaller Ukraine.US-led peace efforts appear unlikely to bring any short-term relief, with the possibility of holding low-level technical talks still under discussion.

Putin, meanwhile, is pressing ahead with the invasion in the belief that Ukrainians will buckle under the pressure and Kyiv’s Western supporters won’t stay the course, Western analysts say.A Russian strike destroyed an apartment block in Pryluky, in Ukraine’s northern Chernihiv region, killing 13 people, including four children, and wounding about 50, Interior Minister Ihor Vyhivskyi said.Deaths were also reported in three other Ukrainian cities, including the capital Kyiv, according to Zelensky.“The Russians wanted to strike painf...