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Russia struck Kharkiv's power plant shortly after Trump announced 'energy ceasefire'

• 2 min read
Russia struck Kharkiv's power plant shortly after Trump announced 'energy ceasefire'
The aftermath of a Russian missile strike on a grocery store in the suburbs of Kharkiv on Oct. 11. (Kharkiv Oblast Military Administration / Telegram) 

Russia struck Kharkiv’s CHP-5 power plant on Oct. 11, President Volodymyr Zelensky said. Ukraine’s Presidential Office confirmed that the attack occurred after U.S. President Donald Trump announced an energy ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine.

"Just now, there was a strike on CHP-5 in Kharkiv — on Kharkiv’s energy infrastructure," Zelensky said at around 8 p.m. local time.

Following the strike on the power plant, a Russian missile strike hit a grocery store in the suburbs of Kharkiv, killing three people and injuring nine, including two children, Kharkiv Oblast Governor Oleh Syniehubov said.

Ukraine had no information about the energy ceasefire announced by Trump, a senior Ukrainian official told the Kyiv Independent.

Trump announced the ceasefire in a Truth Social post, writing: “Effective immediately, there is an ENERGY CEASEFIRE in the War between Russia and Ukraine. Both parties have agreed.”

In an interview following the announcement, Zelensky told Axios that if "President Trump negotiated it with (Vladimir) Putin, please tell us when the ceasefire begins. We are ready, and we will accept it."

Zelensky said Russia had carried out more than 200 strikes on Ukraine’s electricity generation and transmission facilities over the past week, as well as 17 strikes on gas and oil facilities. Russian attacks killed more than 150 people and wounded more than 700 during that period, he added.

Trump’s announcement came less than an hour after Zelensky’s interview with ABC News, in which he said a two-month ceasefire arranged by Trump and Putin would allow him to prepare Ukraine for a new presidential election.

Ukraine has been under martial law since Russia launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022. Ukrainian law prohibits elections while martial law is in effect.

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Olena Goncharova

Special Correspondent

Olena Goncharova is the Special Correspondent for the Kyiv Independent, where she has previously worked as a development manager and Canadian correspondent. She first joined the Kyiv Post, Ukraine's oldest English-language newspaper, as a staff writer in January 2012 and became the newspaper’s Canadian correspondent in June 2018. She is based in Edmonton, Alberta. Olena has a master’s degree in publishing and editing from the Institute of Journalism in Taras Shevchenko National University in Kyiv. Olena was a 2016 Alfred Friendly Press Partners fellow who worked for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette for six months. The program is administered by the University of Missouri School of Journalism in Columbia.

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