Rail Workers Among the Dead as Russia Intensifies Kyiv Strikes

Sun Sep 06 2026 02:09:02 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time)

At least 12 people killed in night raids on Kyiv, including six railway staff, as Russia targets civilian infrastructure while Indian leader urges peace.

A series of overnight missile and drone strikes have claimed nine lives in Kyiv, with six railway workers killed when a depot was hit. Ukrainian authorities report 20 injuries, two of them children, as Russian forces claim to be targeting military and energy sites. In the same hour, a Ukrainian missile strike killed a person in Russia’s western Belgorod region. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has repeatedly called for a cease‑fire, made a plea to President Vladimir Putin at a security summit in Kyrgyzstan.

A lethal wave of missile and drone attacks rolled over Kyiv in the early hours of September 1, killing nine civilians and injuring 20. Six of the fatalities were railway workers of the state‑run Ukrzaliznytsia company after a depot in the capital was struck, an act that has drawn international condemnation for targeting essential civilian infrastructure.

Russian officials have referred to the strikes as a "massive strike using high‑precision weapons," claiming they were aimed at Ukrainian military and energy facilities. In a stark counter‑strike, a Russian missile during the same night killed a person in the western Belgorod region of Russia, underscoring the escalating cross‑border tensions.

The attacks come amid one of Russia’s longest‑running offensives, with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky reporting that over 350 rescue workers had been operating through the night across Kyiv and surrounding areas. He noted that a “significant number of jet drones and ballistic missiles” had been fired, marking the sixth consecutive day of sustained aerial assaults on the capital.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, whose economy remains heavily dependent on discounted Russian oil, has repeatedly urged President Vladimir Putin to end the war. Modi said at a security summit in Kyrgyzstan that “every day spent in war pushes humanity back, and every step taken towards peace fills humanity with new hope and enthusiasm.”

In the wider region, Ukrainian authorities said that eight other towns were hit by the latest wave of strikes, including the residential town of Boryspil where a building collapsed, killing five people. Ukrainian Interior Minister Ivan Vyhivsky confirmed that an Indian national—an Iranian-born trader who was 26 years old—had been among those killed in Boryspil.

The Sunday night attacks followed a previous raid that killed 38 soldiers at a weapons depot in the Kyiv region, when shells, mines and drones detonated. Separately, a drone strike on Russian Baltic Sea port Ust‑Luga caused a fire, Leningrad regional Governor Aleksandr Drozdenko said, adding that such strikes are “legitimate” as they target facilities that finance Moscow’s war effort.