Zelensky warns air defenses are being overwhelmed as Russia pounds Ukraine, killing 9

By Sophie Tanno, Kosta Gak, Helen Regan, Hira Humayun, CNN

(CNN) — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky renewed his plea for Western air defenses following a deadly overnight Russian attack, hours after US President Donald Trump backed away from a public pledge to allow Ukraine to manufacture Patriot interceptors.

The attack is the second major Russian aerial assault in two days, with the Kremlin apparently seeking to expose Kyiv’s shortages of key defense systems as it struggles to make advances along the vast front line.

At least nine people were killed and 30 wounded in the latest attack on Ukraine, including four children, with strikes targeting the capital Kyiv and surrounding regions, according to the city’s mayor Vitali Klitschko.

Only one of the 27 ballistic missiles launched by Russia was shot down.

The Ukrainian president has often appealed to Western nations to provide much-needed air defense systems to protect Ukraine’s cities and critical infrastructure from aerial attacks. The country is facing a shortage of US-made interceptors for Patriots – the only defense system that can bring down certain advanced ballistic missiles.

Yet the situation has become more desperate in recent weeks, with massive Russian assaults claiming the lives of civilians. Earlier this week, Ukrainian authorities said a ballistic missile slammed into a house in the rural village of Radushne, in the Dnipro Region, killing at least six family members, including four children.

In the aftermath of the overnight strikes on Saturday, Zelensky wrote on Telegram, “We lack missiles for the Patriot systems. And it is precisely this shortage of anti-ballistic interceptors that only encourages Russia to carry out such deadly strikes.”

On Friday, Trump said he was hesitant to allow Ukraine to build its own Patriot missile interceptors – an idea he first announced on the sidelines of a NATO summit in Turkey last month.

“We’re talking about it, but it’s a hard thing to give away that kind of technology,” Trump said during a Cabinet meeting at Camp David. “We have to be very careful.” He voiced particular concerns about the risk that Ukraine could someday use the Patriot missile interceptors against the US, even though he acknowledged that it’s unlikely to happen.

The deliberations mark a turnaround from earlier this month, when Trump suggested during the NATO summit that he would aid Ukraine’s fight against Russia by permitting them to build the Patriot systems.

Patriots needed ‘here and now’

A CNN team on the ground heard at least three waves of explosions in the capital overnight.

“People are trapped in a five-story residential building due to falling rocket debris in the Solomyanske district,” Klitschko wrote on Telegram. He said a fire had broken out in the courtyard of a residential building and that emergency services are headed to the scene.

A police officer was among those killed in the strikes in Kyiv. Yehor Terekhin, 22, and his patrol partner were helping people at the site of some shelling when a second strike hit the same location, according to a police statement. Terekhin sustained fatal injuries.

“While saving others, he gave the most precious thing he had – his own life,” a statement from Kyiv’s Patrol Police department said. “He will forever be 22.”

While Kyiv took the brunt of the Russian assault, the regions of Dnipropetrovsk, Sumy, Kharkiv and Poltava were also targeted, according to Zelensky.

“Eighteen buildings, a school, the Lithuanian embassy and infrastructure facilities were damaged,” he added.

Russia’s powerful ballistic missiles are incredibly difficult for Ukraine to intercept because they travel at extremely high speeds. Some of the most advanced missiles can only be shot down using the US-made Patriot defense systems.

“It is crucial that our partners understand that these systems are not needed sitting in warehouses for hypothetical scenarios, but here and now,” Zelensky said on Saturday.

“Every anti-ballistic missile package saves the lives of our people. And every night that we lack them results in casualties.”

Overall, at least 14 civilians have been killed and 87 injured across Ukraine over the past 24 hours, data from local authorities shows.

Meanwhile, Russia intercepted and destroyed 274 Ukrainian drones targeting its territory overnight, including over the Moscow region, according to the Russian Ministry of Defense.

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CNN’s Adam Cancryn, Ivana Kottasová and Svitlana Vlasova contributed reporting.