Russian Strikes Cut Power to Over 600,000 in Ukraine's Dnipropetrovsk Region

More than 600,000 people in Ukraine's eastern Dnipropetrovsk region lost electricity on Sunday after a Russian overnight attack on an energy facility, according to Ukrainian energy provider DTEK, as reported by Al Jazeera. Another 250,000 people in the Kharkiv region were also left without power after a separate strike on an infrastructure facility.

The attacks come as Ukraine prepares for another hard winter and just before U.S.-brokered talks in Abu Dhabi, where Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says Russia is trying to increase pressure on Kyiv.

What happened in the Dnipropetrovsk region?

DTEK said on Telegram that residents of the Pavlohrad, Samarivskyi, Kamianske and Dnipro districts, as well as the city of Dnipro, faced outages on Sunday. The company said the cause was an overnight Russian attack on an energy facility.

Engineers were at the site trying to restore the damaged facility. DTEK said that "repairs are being complicated by repeated attacks," suggesting crews are working under continuing threat.

What about the Kharkiv region?

Al Jazeera reported that Russia struck an infrastructure facility in the Kharkiv region in northeastern Ukraine on Sunday, leaving a further 250,000 Ukrainians without electricity. Mykola Baksheyev, mayor of the city of Zlatopil, said on Telegram that no casualties had been reported.

Baksheyev said power engineers were working to repair the damage but that the exact timeframe for restoring the electricity supply was unknown.

Was this the only attack on the grid?

No. Ukraine's Ministry of Energy said a day earlier that a massive attack on energy facilities had plunged residents of five regions into darkness. The ministry said the attack also significantly hampered electricity transmission in Kyiv.

Al Jazeera described the strikes as part of a wider pattern, saying Russia is stepping up daily aerial attacks that use drones and missiles against the power network.

What does Russia say?

Russia's Ministry of Defence said on its Telegram channel that its forces will keep striking Ukrainian fuel and energy infrastructure. The ministry said the facilities it targets are used to support the Ukrainian military. The statement did not address the outages affecting civilians.

How are the strikes linked to the Abu Dhabi talks?

Zelenskyy has accused Russia of intensifying its attacks to pressure Kyiv at trilateral talks in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, brokered by the United States. The talks are scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday. Al Jazeera's report presents this as Zelenskyy's accusation. Russia's statement framed the strikes only as action against infrastructure it says serves Ukraine's military.

Why does it matter for people in Ukraine?

For residents, the immediate effect is the loss of electricity across large areas. In the Dnipropetrovsk region alone, more than 600,000 people were affected, including those in the city of Dnipro. Officials in both regions said repairs were under way, but DTEK pointed to repeated attacks as a complication. In Kharkiv, authorities could not say when power would return.

The timing adds to concerns about the months ahead. Al Jazeera reported that Ukraine is bracing for yet another harsh winter of war while attacks on the power network continue. Damage to transmission, as reported in Kyiv, and to local facilities, as in Dnipropetrovsk and Kharkiv, shows that the strikes are reaching both national and regional parts of the system.

What happens next?

Repair crews continue to work at the damaged sites, with no restoration date given for the Kharkiv region. The Abu Dhabi talks are due to begin on Tuesday and run through Wednesday.

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Around Prague, based on reporting by Al Jazeera