Ukraine prepares for major blackouts and new attacks on infrastructure

The Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Sunday that Ukraine was preparing for new Russian attacks on its infrastructure, after the mayor of Kyiv urged residents to prepare for the worst-case scenario by making contingency plans to leave the city and stay with friends or family.

Sergei Kovalenko, CEO of Yasnu, a major energy supplier to the capital, said on his Facebook page that the country was facing a 32% shortfall in its expected electricity supply, on Monday, describing it as force majeure.

At the same time, the national energy authorities have warned of a planned outage in the electricity supply, but also indicated the possibility of further restrictions in the capital and the surrounding area as well as in six other regions of the country.

The warnings followed comments by Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko urging residents to think of everything including the worst-case scenario where the capital loses electricity and water supplies.

“If you have a large family … or friends outside Kyiv, where there is an independent water source, stove, heating… please consider staying there for a certain period of time,” he said in a televised interview at the weekend.

In his nightly speech via video conference, Zelensky said that more than 4.5 million consumers are already without electricity.

“We also realize that the terrorist state is concentrating its forces and means for the possibility of repeating mass attacks on our infrastructure…First of all, energy… That’s why Russia needed Iranian missiles,” he added… We’re preparing to respond”.

Zelensky didn’t elaborate on Russia’s need for Iranian missiles to target Ukraine’s energy infrastructure.

Iran admitted for the first time on Saturday that it had supplied Russia with drones that Moscow uses to target power plants and civilian infrastructure, but said it did so before the war.

The Iranian foreign minister also denied that Iran had supplied Russia with missiles.