Russian winter strike leaves nearly 800K homes without power and heat in Ukraine’s Dnipro region

Nearly 800,000 homes in Ukraine were left without electricity and heating Thursday morning after a Russian overnight attack on energy infrastructure, the country’s acting energy minister said, as power crews raced to restore service. Artem Nekrasov said in comments published on the Ukrainian Energy Ministry’s official Telegram channel that the Dnipro and Zaporizhzhia regions were almost completely without power following the Russian strike. "Repair work is ongoing to return light and heat to consumers as soon as possible," Nekrasov said. RUSSIAN DRONE STRIKES TANKER IN Ukraine’S Odesa AFTER ZELENSKYY CLOSES US GAS DEAL Power has since been restored in the Zaporizhzhia region, while hundreds of thousands of homes in Dnipro remain without electricity and heat. Ukrainian officials urged residents to limit the use of high-consumption electrical appliances to prevent renewed outages as repairs continue. Nekrasov said adverse weather conditions also left parts of several other regions without power, including Chernihiv, Kyiv, Ivano-Frankivsk and Zakarpattia. UK, FRANCE STRIKE NEW Ukraine SECURITY PACT AS US TAKES LEAD IN CEASEFIRE ENFORCEMENT The power outages are unfolding amid freezing temperatures in Kyiv, where forecasts show overnight lows under 20 degrees. "There is absolutely no military rationale in such strikes on the energy sector and infrastructure that leave people without electricity and heating in wintertime," Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Thursday on X. "This is Russia’s war specifically against our people, against life in Ukraine – an attempt to break Ukraine." The strikes come just days after Zelenskyy met in Paris with U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff and President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner to discuss continued diplomatic efforts to end Russia’s nearly four-year war. Zelenskyy said the talks focused on security guarantees, monitoring a potential ceasefire, and rebuilding Ukraine as part of a broader framework for peace.