Russian attacks kill 11 civilians on eastern front, Ukraine says

Ukrainian officials said on Saturday that Russian rocket attacks on a town and village close to the eastern frontline had killed at least 11 people, including five children, and wounded eight.

Vadym Filashkin, the governor of the Ukrainian-controlled areas in the Donetsk region, said the Russian army hit the area with a barrage of rockets on Saturday evening, destroying private homes and trapping residents under the rubble. The Russian government did not immediately comment on the reports.

“The enemy is cynically targeting civilians and trying to cause our country as much grief as possible,” he says wrote in a social media post, depicting rescuers searching through the smoldering wreckage of homes in the dark of night. President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine said this in a statement rack that rescue operations were underway. “The Russian attack simply targeted ordinary, private homes,” Mr. Zelensky said.

Saturday’s attack, which could not be independently confirmed, was reported as Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in an escalating cycle of airstrikes in recent days. Moscow in particular has hit Ukrainian territory with some of the largest attacks since the war began almost two years ago, killing 90 civilians and wounding more than 400 in five days. according to the United Nations.

In apparent retaliation, Kiev has attacked Russia’s Belgorod region, which borders Ukraine, with attacks that Russian authorities say have left at least 24 dead and 100 injured. Russia’s claims could not be independently verified.

Ukrainian officials said Saturday’s attack involved S-300 missiles, which are surface-to-air missiles normally used to target aircraft but that Russia is increasingly using to hit ground targets.

The two locations reported to have been hit on Saturday – the city of Pokrovsk and the village of Myrnohrad – are about 40 kilometers (25 miles) from some of the places on the eastern front line where the heaviest fighting took place, including Avdiivka, a city that Russian forces have heavily attacked. months.

It was not the first time that Pokrovsk, a logistics hub for the Ukrainian army, was hit. In August, two Russian missiles hit the city center 37 minutes apart and in virtually the same location, in what appeared to be a “double tap” attack intended to kill rescue workers responding to the initial attack. The attacks killed nine people and injured 82.

Before the war, Pokrovsk had a population of about 50,000. The number dropped to around 30,000 in the spring of 2022, as many people fled west to escape the Russian invasion. But by last spring the number had risen again to 57,000, as residents, eager to get home as the war raged, returned. Others from surrounding hotspots such as Avdiivka also moved to Pokrovsk.

It is unclear whether some people have fled again as fighting has become closer and more intense in recent months. Since the fall, Moscow has launched a series of attacks along its entire eastern front, seeking to encircle the city of Avdiivka, a linchpin of Ukraine’s defenses in the Donetsk region, and apparently taking control of Marinka, about 25 miles southeast of Pokrovsk. week.

The Russian offensive has caused many casualties on both sides, and the cities targeted by Russian attacks have often been reduced to rubble as a result of brutal shelling.