UK prime minister visits Kyiv to show support for Ukraine

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky says energy supply issues persist in the capital and 17 other regions Friday, even after utility officials indicated that power access had been restored across the country.

Speaking in his nightly address, Zelensky said it’s still difficult to get enough electricity to “Kyiv region and Kyiv. It’s very difficult in the Odesa region, and also the Vinnytsia region and Ternopil region.”

The director of Ukraine’s Energy Industry Research Center said earlier Friday that power had been restored nearly everywhere in the country, after 10 million customers lost service due to missile attacks Thursday.

Even when utilities repair infrastructure in Ukraine and customers regain access, operators have had to widely impose emergency cuts to deal with the country’s diminished supply. That means regions only receive a limited amount of energy and are sometimes subject to intentional blackouts aimed at stabilizing and maintaining the fragile grid.

Fighting in the east: In his update, Zelensky also reported “fierce fighting” in the eastern Donetsk region. He claimed that about 100 Russian attacks were repelled in the region on Thursday alone.

Donetsk, which is one of four Ukrainian regions Moscow claims to have annexed, has been subject to some of the conflict’s fiercest fighting.