A Russian missile slammed into a police building in the central Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rih on Friday, killing a policeman and injuring many more people, Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko said.
The police administrative building was destroyed and rescue workers pulled several people out of the rubble after the attack on President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s hometown, Klymenko said on the Telegram messaging app.
He put the number of wounded at 25. In a later update, Regional governor Serhiy Lysak said about 40 had been wounded.
“A policeman was killed as a result of a Russian attack,” Klymenko said in an Telegram post accompanied by photos showing a building that had been reduced to rubble and rescue workers carrying away a man on a stretcher.
Three administrative buildings were damaged, and seven residential buildings, including a high-rise building, suffered damage, regional governor Serhiy Lysak said.
Russia also carried out its fifth drone attack this week on the southern Odesa region, home to Ukrainian ports on the Black Sea and Danube River that are used to export grain and other agricultural products.
Russia has intensified air attacks on Ukrainian grain export infrastructure on the Danube River and in the port of Odesa since mid-July, when Moscow quit the U.N.-brokered deal that allowed safe Ukrainian grain exports via the Black Sea.
“During the night the Russian terrorists attacked the Odesa region for the fifth time this week,” Oleh Kiper, the Odesa regional governor, said on the Telegram messaging app.
Officials said air defences shot down 16 of the 20 drones fired by Russia overnight – the Southern military command said 14 drones had been brought down over Odesa region and two more over the southern region of Mykolaiv.
Kiper said a non-residential building had been damaged by debris from a drone but gave no further details. He reported no casualties in the Odesa region.
Regional officials said Russia had also attacked the southeastern region of Zaporizhzhia and the northeastern region of Sumy with missiles, wounding several people.
Ukraine’s emergency services said three people had been hurt in the Sumy region and posted a video showing rescuers pulling out an injured woman from a hole caused by the explosion.
It said in a statement that the 65-year-old woman and a 70-year-old man were rescued after a two-storey residential building was damaged.
Russia did not immediately comment on the latest attacks.
Source: Agence Tunis Afrique Presse