The mayor of Kyiv said municipal heating has been fully restored to the Ukrainian capital after being knocked out in the latest Russian missile barrage.
Vitali Klitschko’s comments, in a post to Telegram on December 18, came two days after Russia fired nearly 100 missiles targeting Ukrainian electricity and water infrastructure nationwide.
It was one of the heaviest bombardments since the start of the February 24 invasion.
"The city is restoring all services after the latest shelling," Klitschko said. "In particular, the capital's heat supply system was fully restored. All sources of heat supply work normally."
Like in most Ukrainian, and Russian, cities, Kyiv has several central heating plants that provide heat and hot water to hundreds of thousands of houses and apartments.
Few homes have their own hot water boilers; many people have invested in portable heaters, or generators, as Russia has tried to knock out municipal services.
Temperatures in Kyiv, home to 2.8 million people, and many places across Ukraine were below freezing and falling on December 18.
Grid operator Ukrenerho had warned that extensive damage in the north, south, and center of the country meant that repairs could take some time.
“Priority will be given to critical infrastructure: hospitals, water-supply facilities, heat-supply facilities, sewage-treatment plants,” the state-owned company said in a statement late on December 16.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said the December 16 attacks hit parts of Ukraine's military-industrial complex and energy and military administrative facilities.
"As a result of the strike, the transportation of weapons and ammunition of foreign production has been thwarted," the ministry said on December 17. The ministry claimed that Ukraine's plants producing weapons, military equipment, and ammunition had been disabled by the strikes.
In addition to seeking equipment to rebuild its electricity grid and power systems, Ukraine has also sought more sophisticated air-defense systems to shoot down the missiles and drones Russia is deploying.
U.S. officials are reportedly considering shipping Patriot antiaircraft missile systems to Ukraine, something Russian officials have warned would constitute a further escalation.
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Meanwhile, in the Russian region of Belgorod, which borders Ukraine, one person was killed and four wounded by shelling early on December 18, the regional governor in a statement.
Belgorod is one of several Russian regions where targets such as fuel and ammunition stores have been hit by explosions since the start of the February 24 invasion.
Ukraine has rarely taken responsibility for the attacks, though most experts assume they are the work of either cross-border shelling or Ukrainian special forces operating clandestinely.
That same day, Russian military forces shelled the center of Kherson, the major city that Russian soldiers retreated from last month in one of Moscow's biggest battlefield setbacks in Ukraine.
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Russia has shown no sign of letting up the fight against Ukraine, even as some Western military experts have speculated the tempo of fighting may decline in the colder temperatures. Ukraine has vowed to keep up the fight.
The heaviest December snow in nearly three decades blanketed Moscow on December 18. One of Russia's largest military training grounds is located just outside the city. Ukraine has vowed to keep up the fight regardless of the weather.
Late in the evening on December 18, Ukraine's General Staff announced it had destroyed at least two Russian ammunition depots and anti-aircraft system positions during fighting in the Donbas in the east.
Russia has been throwing thousands of recently mobilized troops into combat in the Donbas where fighting has been brutal and losses on both sides heavy. Russian forces has been trying for weeks to take Bakhmut, a key logistics center in the Donbas.
Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych said that a Russian unit of 400 to 800 men had been ambushed near Bakhmut.
Russia’s Defense Ministry, meanwhile, said on December 18 that Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu inspected troops involved in the invasion. The ministry did not say where or when Shoigu’s trip took place and whether he visited the Donbas.
Shoigu "made a working trip to the Southern Military District and inspected troops in the areas of the special military operation," the ministry said in a statement on Telegram, using the term that Moscow uses to describe the invasion.
Shoigu spoke with soldiers "on the front line" and listened to reports from military officials at a "command post,” the ministry said.
Shoigu's trip comes days before Russian President Vladimir Putin is set to chair an annual, expanded meeting with the Defense Ministry. The exact date of the meeting has not been announced.
Pavel Sarubin, the host of the weekly television program Moscow.Kremlin.Putin, told state media on December 18 that the Russian leader will make "important statements" at the meeting.
Putin could announce a further mobilization of the Russian economy to serve the needs of the military, media reports speculated. Russia's armed forces have suffered from a lack of supplies and weapons.
At a goverment meeting last week, Putin demanded that armament plans be adjusted.
