Ukrainian air defence downed more than 10 Russian drones during the third attack on the Ukrainian capital in four days, Serhiy Popko, head of Kyiv’s military administration, said today.

In recent days, Vladimir Putin’s forces launched their biggest air attack on Ukraine since the war began as more than 200 missiles and drones struck towns and cities across the country.

Ukraine has successfully negotiated debt relief of more than $20bn from private international bondholders, bolstering Kyiv’s efforts to finance its escalating war against Russia.

Ukraine’s finance ministry said that all Ukraine’s bondholders voted in favour of the deal that will reduce the face value of their debt by more than a third.

It will unlock $11bn for the country’s finances over the next three years by lowering interest payments.

“This is an important step on Ukraine’s path to restoring long-term economic stability and will enable our swifter re-entry to international markets once the security situation improves,” Sergii Marchenko, the Ukrainian finance minister, said on Wednesday.

Ukraine’s first lady wants her country’s children to view themselves not as a generation enduring a grinding war but rather as “a generation of winners.”

On the sidelines of a day spent at a rehabilitation camp for Ukrainian children in the relatively safe western city of Uzhhorod, Olena Zelenska said on Tuesday that working with the next generation was a moral obligation and a “strategic priority” for Ukraine’s future.

Many of the children will return to front-line cities after spending a few weeks at the camp created by Voices of the Children charity, barely enough time to overcome the trauma they face over and over.

“This issue needs to be addressed immediately, as soon as it arises, before it grows into something more,” Ms Zelenska told The Associated Press in a brief interview at the camp, which is sponsored by the foundation that bears her name.

A study by the Olena Zelenska Foundation, funded entirely by foreign donations, and the Kyiv School of Economics this year found that 44 per cent of Ukrainian children show signs of post-traumatic stress disorder.

“To ensure our children do not become a lost generation, we as adults must take quick action,” Ms Zelenska said. “It’s difficult with the ongoing defense of the country. However, I am confident that political will combined with international cooperation can work wonders.”

Russia is getting increasingly desperate and the attacks are becoming more cowardly, the British ambassador said in a statement at the UN Security Council meeting.

James Kariuki, the UK deputy permanent representative to the UN, condemned Vladimir Putin for the alleged war crimes in Ukraine and his “continued barbarity” against the Ukrainian people.

“President Putin thought Kyiv would fall within days. He was wrong. And Ukrainian courage continues to prove him wrong every day,” he said.

He said over 35,000 civilians in Ukraine have been confirmed killed or injured since Russia’s invasion began.

“These most recent attacks represent continued evidence that Russia is intentionally targeting civilian energy infrastructure, risking further humanitarian crisis this coming winter,” he added.

A number of people were killed and at least 14 were injured in the eastern town of Kupiansk, Kharkiv Oblast, officials said.

Kupyansk, which is located 22 miles (35 km) from the border with Russia, was hit in the afternoon, damaging a hotel, residential buildings, cars, shops and other civilian infrastructure.

“There was a strike with a guided aerial bomb on Kupyansk – right in the city centre, people were under the rubble. Unfortunately, there are fatalities,” Volodymyr Zelensky said in his nightly address.

He did not confirm the number of deaths.

Several explosions were heard in Kyiv this morning amid an air raid alert, and drone debris fell on a playground.

Ukraine’s air defences have been active in the capital and the wider Kyiv Oblast, officials said, according to Kyiv Independent.

Debris from the drones fell on a playground in the capital’s Dniprovskyi district, but no one has been injured, mayor Vitali Klitschko said.

Some Nato member countries have called for clearing restrictions on the use of long-range missiles against Russia, according to reports.

The Nato-Ukraine Council met yesterday and Nato secretary general Jens Stoltenberg said: “Allies today reaffirmed they are stepping up their military aid to Ukraine.

“We must continue to provide Ukraine with the equipment and munitions it needs to defend itself against Russia’s invasion. This is vital for Ukraine’s ability to stay in the fight,” he said.

Several Nato countries called for allowing Ukraine to use weapons supplied by western allies, specifically long-range missiles, a diplomatic source told AFP.

Poland’s foreign minister Radosław Sikorski highlighted that Russia was using long-range weapons against Ukraine.

He urged allies to “let Ukraine fight with whatever it has, with whatever we have delivered them and let’s deliver them more”.

The US restricts the use of long-range ballistic missiles it provides to Ukraine, which wants to aim them at military targets inside Russia.

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, in his latest address, called on the West to lift restrictions on long-range airstrikes by Ukraine.

“We continue to insist that decisiveness now, removing restrictions on Ukraine for long-range strikes now, will help us end the war as quickly as possible in a just manner for Ukraine and the entire world,” he said.

Russia said its forces had defused unexploded US-supplied munitions fired by Ukraine that were shot down just 5 km (3 miles) from Russia’s Kursk nuclear power plant, which Moscow has accused Ukrainian forces of trying to strike.

The announcement was made by Russia’s National Guard and accompanied by a video of the unexploded munitions and of sappers blowing them up.

It came a day after Rafael Grossi, the head of the UN nuclear watchdog, inspected the plant, which he said was vulnerable due to a lack of a protective dome that could shield it from missiles, drones or artillery.

There was no immediate comment from Ukraine on the purported Russian find, and Reuters could not independently verify the location of the video.

Russia’s foreign ministry has banned 92 American citizens including journalists, lawyers, and the heads of what it said were key military-industrial firms from entering Russia over Washington’s Russophobic stance, it said.

The list, published on Telegram by the ministry, included 14 Wall Street Journal employees, five senior journalists from the New York Times and four from the Washington Post.

The Wall Street Journal, whose journalist Evan Gershkovich was freed this month in a prisoner exchange after 16 months in Russian detention, described the bans as “laughable” and part of attacks on free press.

Russia’s foreign ministry said it was targeting editorial staff and reporters from “leading liberal-globalist publications” involved in producing and disseminating what it described as “fakes” about the Russian armed forces.

It said the bans were in response to the Biden administration’s “Russophobic course”, a key part of which has been sweeping sanctions on Russian politicians, business figures, scientists and journalists.

“We remind the current US authorities about the inevitability of punishment for hostile actions, whether it is direct encouragement of (Ukrainian President Volodymyr) Zelensky and his henchmen to commit acts of aggression and terrorist attacks, or attempts to interfere in the internal affairs of the Russian Federation,” the ministry said.

In a statement, a Wall Street Journal spokesperson said: “The Putin regime is farcically consistent in its all-out assault on free press and truth. This laughable list of targets is no exception.”