Putin’s a ‘Nazi,’ Zelenskyy says as Russia intensifies attacks on energy grid ahead of Victory Day

KYIV — Russia pummeled Ukrainian energy infrastructure early Wednesday morning, as the Kremlin geared up to celebrate the May 9 Victory Day holiday that traditionally marks the Soviet triumph over Nazi Germany, but has more recently become emblematic of the war on Ukraine.

Ukraine’s Air Force reported shooting down 39 of the 55 missiles fired at several of its regions, and 20 of the 21 Shahed drones launched by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s forces.

“On Remembrance and Victory over Nazism in World War II Day, Nazi Putin launched a massive missile attack on Ukraine,” the country’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a statement Wednesday morning. “The entire world must understand who is who. The world must not give a chance to new Nazism.”

For decades, Moscow’s annual May 9 parade has been not so much a memorial to victory over Nazi Germany in World War II, as a carefully choreographed show of might and power. Since Russia launched its full-scale invasion in 2022, the Kremlin has intensified attacks on Ukraine ahead of Victory Day to help its propaganda efforts — seeking to give Putin something to boast about in his annual speech on Red Square.

This year, Russia’s forces were ordered to capture Ukraine’s strategic city of Chasiv Yar in the Donetsk region ahead of May 9. While they have yet to succeed in that task, the Russians have taken advantage of Ukraine’s shortage of weapons and troop exhaustion to rapidly gain territory, taking control of several small villages in the Donetsk region.

Ukraine’s Energy Minister German Galushchenko said Wednesday’s attacks were aimed mainly at civilian energy infrastructure, targeting power generation and electricity transmission facilities in the Poltava, Kirovohrad, Zaporizhzhia, Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk and Vinnytsia regions.

“The enemy wants to deprive us of the ability to sufficiently generate and transmit electricity,” Galushchenko said, urging Ukrainians to limit energy use, especially during the morning and evening peak periods. “This is the contribution of each of us to victory. Light will prevail,” the minister added.

Ukraine’s largest private energy company DTEK reported the attacks had seriously damaged equipment at three of its power plants overnight. “This is already the fifth massive shelling of the company’s energy facilities in the last month and a half,” the company said in a statement.