Kyiv, Ukraine - Russian forces fired a barrage of missiles at several major Ukrainian cities over the course of Sunday night, setting Kyiv's historic Dormition Cathedral on fire and killing nine people across the country.
The wave of attacks came as news of a US-Iran deal opened a potential path to peace in the Middle East war, highlighting the lack of progress toward an end to over four years of fighting in Ukraine.
Five rescue workers were killed during firefighting operations in northeast Ukraine, after Russian strikes hit the city of Kharkiv, Interior Minister Igor Klymenko said on Monday. At least nine others were wounded.
The violence killed another four people in Kyiv as fire broke out on the grounds of the UNESCO world heritage site Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra and across the roof of the Dormition Cathedral.
Residents were seen running through the streets seeking shelter as projectiles were intercepted in the sky and glowing debris fell across the city, AFP journalists in the capital witnessed.
More than a dozen fire trucks surrounded the cathedral with firefighters working tirelessly to extinguish the blaze from the inside and from aerial platforms.
A gaping hole could be seen on one side of the church, with flames visible from the roof, which has been partially destroyed.
A building in the capital's Mystetsky Arsenal National Art and Museum Complex also caught fire, according to Ukraine's emergency services.
Russia conducts repeated strikes against Ukraine
Russian attacks damaged several buildings in the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra complex in January, the Ministry of Culture reported at the time.
The Kyiv Pechersk Lavra, a monastery with emblematic golden domes, had made headlines in recent years after the expulsion of its monks, who were accused of having ties with Moscow.
Head of the local military administration, Tymur Tkachenko, condemned the "direct strike" on the site. Kyiv's Metropolitan Epiphanius also denounced the attack as a "crime against humanity, history, and Christianity."
At least 25 people have reportedly been wounded in the capital and 140,000 residents in the city's northern districts were left without electricity following the attack. The major city of Kharkiv, in the northeast, also came under heavy missile fire.
"Five State Emergency Service rescuers were killed during firefighting operations as a result of a repeated Russian strike," Interior Minister Igor Klymenko said on Telegram. At least nine people were also injured.
The head of the military administration in the Dnipropetrovsk region, Oleksandr Hanzha, said that the city of Dnipro had also been targeted and two people were injured.
The head of the Sumy region, Oleg Grygorov, said three people had been wounded in the northeastern district, including a child.
A Ukrainian drone strike killed three people and wounded three others in the Russian city of Tula, around 120 miles south of Moscow, the regional governor Dmitry Milyaev also announced on Monday.
Zelensky calls on Trump to assist in peace negotiations
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Russian leader Vladimir Putin both called President Donald Trump on Sunday, amid the US leader's birthday celebrations, to discuss the conflict in Ukraine.
Zelensky said on X that he had "discussed things that could help bring about peace now," while his adviser Dmytro Lytvyn told the press he was pleased with a "quite substantive conversation about everything" between the two leaders.
The Kremlin said the conversation between Putin and Trump focused exclusively on peace negotiations between the US and Iran.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine has turned into Europe's worst conflict since World War II, with thousands of civilians and hundreds of thousands of troops killed.
Amid near-daily pummeling of its cities by Russian drones and missiles, Ukraine has in recent weeks stepped up its own aerial attacks.
Kremlin adviser Yury Ushakov told the press that "US presidential special representatives Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, who are currently closely involved in Iranian affairs, will return to Russia soon"