Bombay Durpun - Freezing Kyiv residents seek warmth in trains and tents

Elderly people sat in heated train carriages, families living in freezing apartment blocks ate dinner in heated tents on the street, and one animal shelter took in stray cats at risk of dying from the cold.

Russia has targeted Ukrainian energy infrastructure throughout the nearly four-year war.

But Kyiv says this winter has been the toughest yet, as hundreds of Russian drones and missiles have overwhelmed its air defences during a particularly cold spell.

"The power in our building mostly comes on at night since the last massive strike," said 30-year-old lawyer Daria Grechanova, who met AFP at a heated tent in the capital.

"Our building has electric heating. It's extremely cold there, 5-7C, and living like that with a small child isn't normal," she added.

Grechanova, who is pregnant, said the lift to her 10th floor apartment was not working due to the power cuts. She also has no way of cooking for her child.

"We've been forced to use these 'invincibility points' because they have hot meals," she said, referring to the name municipal authorities use for hubs where residents can access heating and electricity.

Authorities warn conditions could worsen if cold temperatures persist.

More than 1,000 Ukrainians have been taken to hospital with frostbite and hypothermia since late December alone, according to the health ministry.

- 'Any way we can' -

Animals have also suffered from the low temperatures.

At Kyiv's Hatul Madan animal shelter, which rescues cats evacuated from front line areas, volunteer Kateryna Rymaruk said she was heating the animals with everything she could -- including bottles of warm water and USB-powered heat pads.

"We're saving them any way we can, because no matter what, it's still warmer here than outside," the 41-year-old told AFP.

Railway carriages have become an unlikely source of warmth for other residents.

Up to 100 people visit them daily, 48-year-old railway worker Oksana Pidgorets told AFP.

"Tea, coffee, cookies, wafers, water are free," she said, adding that staff were keeping a coal-fired heater burning "round the clock".

Some of the carriages contain charging stations, as well as microwaves and access to satellite internet, according to the Ukrainian government.

Earlier in January, Kyiv's mayor Vitali Klitschko made a rare appeal to evacuate over the attacks.

More than half a million have left the capital since then, Klitschko told AFP on Tuesday.

Russia, which invaded Ukraine in February 2022, says its strikes are aimed at energy infrastructure fuelling Ukraine's "military-industrial complex".

Kyiv says the strikes are a war crime designed to wear down its civilian population into submission.

UN human rights chief Volker Turk said Tuesday that civilians were bearing the brunt of the attacks and called on Russia to stop them, accusing Moscow of having breached the "rules of warfare".

C.F.Salvi--BD