Zelenskyy calls for European air defence system as Russian strike wounds 13 in Ukrainian city

Russian forces bombarded the southern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia with rockets overnight, wounding 13 people, including two children, officials said Tuesday (September 16), as President Volodymyr Zelenskyy urged European leaders to make the continent safe by building an ambitious air defence umbrella.With the war grinding on since Russia’s full-scale invasion of its neighbour more than 3½ years ago, there has been no let-up in Russian strikes on civilian areas of Ukraine and its army’s push on the roughly 1,000-kilometre front line.

A peace settlement appears to be no closer despite months of US-led peace efforts. US President Donald Trump’s ultimatums and deadlines for Putin to engage with proposals to stop the fighting have passed without obvious consequences.

Just over the past two weeks, Zelenskyy said on Telegram, Russia has launched more than 3,500 drones, more than 2,500 powerful glide bombs and almost 200 missiles at targets inside Ukraine.Russian glide bombs, usually dropped by jets at high altitude and far behind the front line, and drone swarms are a major challenge for Ukrainian defences. Glide bombs aren’t very accurate, but they leave big craters, and Ukraine has no effective countermeasure against them.

Russian drones also recently landed on Polish soil, prompting NATO to beef up the alliance’s European air defences as tensions with Moscow mounted.

“Now is the time to implement the joint protection of our European skies with a multilayered air defence system. All the technologies for this are available,” Zelenskyy said on Telegram. “We need investments and desire, we need strong actions and decisions from all our partners.” In Zaporizhzhia, the Russian barrage struck more than 20 apartment buildings, starting fires, regional head Ivan Fedorov said on national television.

“We hadn’t yet recovered from enemy strikes on Aug. 30. We are currently repairing those buildings, those windows, but now the enemy has added more work for our municipal workers,” Fedorov said.

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