Russia Strikes Kyiv on Eve of NATO Summit, Killing at Least Eight

Russia struck Kyiv with ballistic and cruise missiles and drones in the early hours of Monday, killing at least eight people and wounding dozens, city officials said, hours after President Volodymyr Zelensky warned that Moscow was preparing a fresh massive strike. The barrage — the second on the Ukrainian capital and its surroundings in less than a week — landed one day before NATO leaders convene in Ankara for a summit whose central questions are air defence and how much allies will spend to provide it.

Explosions echoed across central Kyiv as the assault unfolded. Rescuers evacuated residents, including children, from the upper floors of a damaged building in the Podilskyi district, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said on Telegram, adding that a search for people still trapped was continuing. Residential blocks in the southeastern Darnytskyi district were badly damaged and evacuated. Ukraine's air force said the attack involved ballistic missiles, cruise missiles and drones.

"The enemy is striking with ballistic missiles," Tymur Tkachenko, head of Kyiv's city military administration, wrote as the strikes continued. Initial reports cited by Reuters put the toll at seven dead and 24 wounded before it rose.

A second barrage in a week

Monday's attack followed an even deadlier assault on Kyiv early on 2 July, when an 11-hour drone-and-missile bombardment killed 30 people — among the deadliest strikes on the capital since Russia's full-scale invasion began more than four years ago. Ukraine's air force said Russia fired 74 missiles and 496 drones that night; more than 30 sites were damaged across the city, roughly 20 of them residential buildings, and over 50,000 people sheltered in metro stations.

Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha called that assault a "night of horror." The Kremlin, whose spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Russia strikes "exclusively" against military or military-linked targets, has repeatedly rejected accusations that it targets civilians. Over the same days, Ukraine pressed its own long-range campaign, hitting a major oil refinery in Russia's Nizhny Novgorod region and a railway bridge in occupied Luhansk.

Zelensky framed the timing as deliberate, coming days after the US Independence Day holiday and on the doorstep of the alliance meeting.

"Any delay with missiles for our air defense – missiles for Patriots – means the loss of lives, and it encourages Russia to continue the war," Zelensky said, urging allies to accelerate deliveries. He called the timing "typical of Putin: right after America's Independence Day and before the NATO Summit in Ankara."

The summit the strikes will shape

The heads of state and government of NATO's 32 members meet on 7-8 July at the Beştepe Presidential Complex in Ankara. Secretary General Mark Rutte has set three priorities: raising allied defence investment, expanding transatlantic defence-industrial production, and sustaining support for Ukraine. New alliance capability targets envisage a roughly fivefold increase in air-defence capacity — the very systems Kyiv says it needs faster.

Money frames all of it. At last year's summit in The Hague, allies agreed to lift defence spending toward 5% of GDP by 2035, split into 3.5% for core defence and 1.5% for related investment such as infrastructure and cyber resilience. Contributions to Ukraine's defence, including its arms industry, count toward the goal. Some members are expected to reach 5% in 2026, well ahead of schedule, and the alliance is set to announce tens of billions of dollars in new defence contracts in Ankara.

US President Donald Trump is due to attend and to meet Zelensky on the margins; Washington has signalled Trump would speak with President Vladimir Putin afterward as it seeks to revive stalled peace efforts. That transatlantic triangle — American pressure on Europeans to spend, and American diplomacy toward Moscow — will hang over every session.

Why it reaches Luxembourg

The pledges made in Ankara land directly on smaller members. Luxembourg has long been NATO's lowest spender as a share of output, averaging just under 0.6% of GDP between 2014 and 2024. Its government roadmap, set in June 2024, targets 2% of gross national income by 2030 — a benchmark it now expects to meet — with defence outlays rising from about €728 million in 2024 toward a projected €1.46 billion by the end of the decade.

Reaching 2% immediately, from January 2026, would cost roughly €1.2 billion a year — some €400 million above what is budgeted. Defence Minister Yuriko Backes has said the 2030 roadmap remains in force but that the government is "continuing to reflect on the possibility of accelerating the trajectory," a decision expected around the summit. Analysts note that the Grand Duchy faces the steepest proportional adjustment of any ally to approach a 5% figure.

For Luxembourg, as for the rest of Europe, the strikes on Kyiv are a reminder that the numbers debated in Ankara translate, on nights like Monday's, into whether interceptors are in place when the missiles come.

• At least 8 killed, dozens wounded in Kyiv on 6 July, per city officials.
• 30 killed in the earlier 2 July barrage of 74 missiles and 496 drones.
• NATO summit: 7-8 July, Ankara, 32 members.
• 5% of GDP spending target by 2035 (3.5% core + 1.5% related).
• Luxembourg: 2% of GNI by 2030; ~€728m spent in 2024.