United States: The United States Embassy in Kyiv posted an urgent alert on the morning of Wednesday that Moscow may plan to strike “a significant air attack” and ordered its personnel to evacuate and seek refuge.
As reports suggest, an Air-raid siren is something Ukrainians wake up to daily. Drones and missiles frequently target Kyiv, but the US embassy seldom issues this kind of urgent alert or temporary closure notice.
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At least two other Western embassies were also affected – Greek and Italian – said they would be closing for the day following the warning issued by the United States.
The warning came a day after Ukraine’s military targeted Russian territory for the first time with American-made Ballistic missiles upon receiving the go-ahead from Biden.
Russian response to missile attack
The Kremlin had long warned that such strikes would be considered an escalation, and on Tuesday pledged to act accordingly.
According to Sergei V. Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, “We will be taking this as a qualitatively new phase of the Western war against Russia,” the New York Times reported.
“And we will react accordingly,” he said in a conference on Tuesday.
Moreover, in its Wednesday message, the US Embassy stated it had “received specific information” regarding a probable attack, of which they did not offer more details.
This called upon Americans to pay particular attention to the air raid signals.
Kyiv is in an alarming state
Just before 2 p.m., the Ukrainian authorities issued a report about impending ballistic missile attacks and encouraged people in Kyiv to evacuate.
When the alarm spread and the people of Kyiv started running to bunkers, Ukraine’s Military Intelligence said that Russia wanted to create tension by ‘reporting’ that Ukraine was preparing for a large-scale attack.
Moscow has reported a series of attacks on Ukraine this week, a devastating airstrikes which lasted for hours on Sunday, claimed at least nine people’s lives, the New York Times reported.
A rocket strike later that day on a residential building in the city of Sumy, near the Russian border, killed ten people.
And that was only the start of the week: there was an attack in the port city of Odesa that killed 11 more people and one in the county’s Sumy region on Monday night that claimed 11 lives. Many people have been left injured from the attacks.