KYIV, Ukraine — Russia attacked facilities of Ukraine’s Naftogaz Group 13 times over the past week and has targeted its premises almost 300 times since the start of the year, the state energy company said Monday. Russia has repeatedly battered the Ukrainian power grid since its all-out invasion more than four years ago. Moscow hopes to sap Ukraine’s will to fight by denying civilians light, heating and running water during the bitter winter months. Ukrainian officials, who say Russia is “weaponizing winter,” fear Moscow will pursue its campaign through the coming winter, too. Russian drones and missiles struck facilities in several regions of the country, with one asset hit multiple times during the week, Naftogaz said, reporting serious damage to equipment and production capacity. No employees were hurt in the attacks, the company said. With troops largely bogged down by drones and robots along the roughly 1,250-kilometre (780-mile) front line, both Russia and Ukraine are expanding their aerial campaigns and devising new long-range weapons. Ukrainian long-range attacks on Russia killed seven people, while four civilians died in Ukraine after strikes by Moscow’s forces, officials said Monday as they collated overnight attacks. Ukraine depended heavily on foreign military aid after Russia’s full-scale invasion of February 2022 but has gradually increased its domestically produced firepower, firing a salvo of more than 800 long-range drones at Russia on Sunday. Ukraine also has successfully targeted depots owned by Wildberries, Russia’s main online retailer, as far as 2,000 kilometres (1,242 miles) from Ukraine’s border. Russian forces have increasingly hit apartment blocks, ports, schools and hospitals, among other urban targets, killing close to 17,000 civilians, according to the United Nations. The death toll of 437 Ukrainian civilians in July was 70 per cent higher than the same month in 2025, it said last week, as Russia’s barrages intensified. Russia has exploited Ukraine’s severe shortage of U.S.-made Patriot air defense interceptors, which are the only way of countering ballistic missiles. But Kyiv is swiftly innovating, with Ukraine now developing its own ballistic missile to hit back at Russia and working with European countries on developing more anti-ballistic air defenses. ___ Hanna Arhirova, The Associated Press
