Nine killed, historic monastery on fire as Ukraine faces major Russian attacks

Four people were killed while the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra ‌monastery, a symbol of Ukrainian spiritual and cultural history, caught fire, in the heaviest Russian air attack on the Ukrainian capital in two weeks, authorities said on Monday, urging residents to take shelter.



The attack damaged electricity lines and left 140,000 Kyiv residents without power, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said on the Telegram messaging app, adding that some houses and cars caught fire after being hit by drone debris.



The central Kyiv Pechersk Lavra monastery, a UNESCO World Heritage site founded in 1051, was seriously damaged in a direct attack, Tymur Tkachenko, the head of the capital's military administration, said in a separate Telegram post.



The fresh strikes came after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Sunday he had spoken to U.S. President Donald Trump and discussed efforts to achieve an end to the more than four-year conflict, ​ahead of a G7 meeting in France this week.