By Svitlana Vlasova, Victoria Butenko, Todd Symons and Nadeen Ebrahim

Kyiv, Ukraine (CNN) — Russia launched its largest aerial assault of the Ukraine war overnight into Sunday, deploying more than 800 drones and striking a government building in Kyiv for the first time.

An infant was among at least two people killed in drone strikes on several residential buildings in the capital, which was under an air-raid siren for 11 hours, Kyiv’s city office said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on X that a total of four people had been killed across all of Ukraine Sunday and 44 had been injured.

Moscow’s forces launched a total of 810 drones, four ballistic missiles and nine cruise missiles, the Ukrainian Air Force said. While most were shot down by air defenses, 54 drones and nine missiles hit targets across Ukraine, the air force said.

That surpasses the size of a July attack by Moscow that was previously the largest of the war, which began with Russia’s full-scale invasion of its neighbor in February 2022.

The assault comes after recent attempts by Kyiv’s Western allies to broker a peace deal as momentum to end the war stalls, leaving the White House frustrated. In an interview with ABC News aired Sunday, Zelensky said that US President Donald Trump “gave (Russian President Vladimir) Putin what he wanted” at last month’s Alaska summit between the two world leaders which ended with no concrete deal.

On Sunday, Zelensky described the latest attack as “vile,” saying “such killings now, when real diplomacy could have started a long time ago, are a deliberate crime and a prolongation of the war.”

“The world can make the Kremlin’s criminals stop killing, all we need is political will,” Zelensky said.

Earlier this week, Putin said any Western troops in Ukraine would be considered “legitimate targets for defeat,” a day after it was announced that dozens of Western countries have pledged to contribute to a potential peacekeeping force there if a ceasefire deal is agreed.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko called it a “massive attack,” saying the cities of Kryvyi Rih, Dnipro, Kremenchuk, and Odesa all came under fire, as well as Kyiv.

In the capital, the building that houses the prime minister’s office, as well as some government ministries, was struck in the assault, she said.

“For the first time, the Government building, its roof, and upper floors were damaged by the enemy attacks. Rescuers are extinguishing the fire. I thank them for their work,” Svyrydenko said.

The building is in Kyiv’s government quarter, next to the parliament and close to the office of the president.

“We will rebuild the buildings. But the lives lost cannot be brought back. Every day, the enemy terrorizes and kills our people across the country,” said Svyrydenko.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian Defense Minister Denys Shmygal said that in the coming week, a meeting will be held focusing on “strengthening air defense and enhancing Ukraine’s capability to respond with strikes deep into the aggressor’s territory.”

Ukraine said Sunday that it had attacked two Russian energy facilities overnight in Russia’s Bryansk region and the southern Krasnodar Territory.

Residential buildings targeted

Rescuers found the body of an infant under the rubble of a building in the western Kyiv neighborhood of Sviatoshynskyi, said Tymur Tkachenko, head of the city’s military administration.

The child was under the age of one, according to Kyiv’s mayor Vitali Klitschko, who said a young woman was also killed.

A nine-floor apartment building in the Sviatoshynskyi district was “severely damaged,” Klitschko said in a Telegram post, adding that four floors of the building were “partially destroyed.”

“Also in Sviatoshynskyi district, debris hit a 16-story residential building, causing a fire on the 15th and 16th floors.” Klitschko said. There were fires at two additional multistory apartment blocks in the same district, and at another building in the eastern Darnytskyi district, he said.

At least 18 people were wounded, Ukraine’s State Emergency Services (SES) said, describing the drone strikes on the capital as a “massive attack.” The agency released images showing several buildings with large holes in the side and firefighters working at the scene.

Russia’s attack also hit a bridge in Kremenchuk over the Dnipro River, in a rare attack far from the frontlines. The bridge is a main crossing point over the river dividing the country into its left and right banks.

‘From strike to strike’

Residents were startled by the attack, with some telling CNN it was the most terrifying attack of the war. Yulia, a local resident, said she woke up to explosions that left whistles in her ears as her building shook. “Everyone feels the same way, everyone is shaking, everyone hopes that it will fly past and not hit them. We don’t feel anything anymore, except anger,” she said.

Olha Biliashova, another resident who lives near a hit building, said that “in all four years of war, this was the first time it was extremely scary.”

“That’s how we live, from attack to attack, from strike to strike.”

French President Emmanuel Macron condemned the attack, saying in a post on X that Russia “is locking itself ever deeper into the logic of war and terror.”

“By Ukraine’s side, we will continue to do everything to ensure that a just and lasting peace prevails,” Macron said.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said “once again, the Kremlin is mocking diplomacy, trampling international law and killing indiscriminately.”

The head of the European Union’s executive arm said on X that Europe stands “fully behind Ukraine,” adding that “we are reinforcing Ukraine’s armed forces, building lasting security guarantees, and tightening sanctions to increase pressure on Russia.”

Earlier on Sunday, aircraft had been activated to ensure the safety of Polish airspace following Russian attacks in western Ukraine near the border with Poland, the country’s armed forces said, according to Reuters.

“Polish and allied aircraft are operating in our airspace, while ground-based air defense and radar reconnaissance systems have been brought to the highest state of readiness,” Poland’s operational command said in a post on X.

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