Rescuers work to remove debris from a building damaged in a military coup amid the Russian invasion of Odessa, Ukraine, April 24, 2022. STRINGER / Reuters
The Russians fired missiles at southern and eastern Ukraine on Saturday, Ukrainian authorities said, including the one that destroyed the runway at the main airport in the strategic Black Sea port of Odessa.
Moscow has turned its focus to the south and east of Ukraine after failing to capture the capital Kyiv in a nine-week attack that devastated cities, killed thousands of civilians and forced more than 5 million to flee abroad.
His forces occupied mostly the eastern port of Mariupol and captured the southern city of Kherson, giving them a foothold just 100 km (62 miles) north of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula, which was annexed by Russia in 2014.
West of Kherson in Odessa, which has so far been relatively unharmed in the war, a Russian missile strike from Crimea destroyed the runway at the main airport, said Maxim Marchenko, Odessa’s regional governor.
“Thank God no one was hurt. “Anti-sabotage measures are being implemented in the region,” Marchenko said. The Ukrainian military has said the airport can no longer be used.
There was no immediate comment on the strike from Moscow, whose forces are sporadically targeting Odessa, Ukraine’s third-largest city. Eight people were killed in a Russian attack on the city last week, Ukrainian authorities said.
Moscow’s attack in the south is aimed in part at linking the region to Crimea, as it insists on full control of Ukraine’s eastern Donbass region. Parts of the two provinces of Donbass, Luhansk and Donetsk, were already controlled by Russian-backed separatists before Moscow’s February 24th invasion.
In the city of Dobropilya in Donetsk, a shock wave on Saturday blew up the windows of an apartment building and left a large crater in the yard.
A resident, who gave only his name, Andriy, said his partner was in a room facing the yard at the time of the attack and was unconscious.
“Thank God the four children were in the kitchen,” he said, standing in the ruined living room.
Residents inspected their belongings to see what could be saved.
“Around 9:20 in the morning, this happiness flew to our house,” said another resident, Oleh, sarcastically. “Everything is destroyed.”
Moscow has called its actions a “special operation” to disarm Ukraine and free it from Western-backed anti-Russian nationalism. Ukraine and the West say Russia has started an unprovoked aggressive war.
Despite weeks of peace talks, both sides seemed as far away as ever on Saturday.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the lifting of Western sanctions against Moscow was part of the talks, but top Ukrainian negotiator Mikhail Podoliak denied it was.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky insists that sanctions must be strengthened and cannot be negotiated. He warned on Friday that talks could fail because of what he called Russia’s “handbook on killing people”.
Ukraine accuses Russian troops of committing atrocities when they withdrew from areas near Kyiv in early April. Moscow denies the allegations. The negotiators last met face to face on March 29th and have been talking on video ever since.
The United States and its European allies have imposed broad sanctions on the Russian economy and provided Ukraine with weapons and humanitarian aid.
US President Joe Biden is seeking a $ 33 billion aid package for Kyiv, including $ 20 billion in weapons, and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Saturday that his country would continue to “give Ukrainians the equipment they need to defend themselves.” .
Lavrov said that if Washington and its partners in the US-led NATO military alliance really want to resolve the crisis, they must stop sending weapons to Kyiv.
Russia announced new Ukrainian strikes on its territory on Saturday.
Officials in Russia’s Bryansk region, which borders Ukraine and Belarus, said the air defense had prevented a Ukrainian plane from entering. The shelling hit parts of a Russian oil terminal, they said.
South of Bryansk in the Russian Kursk region, also on the Ukrainian border, several shells were fired from Ukraine at a Russian checkpoint, Kursk Governor Roman Starovoit said. There were no casualties, he added.
Ukraine has not taken direct responsibility for a series of such incidents on Russian territory. But a series of bombings in southern Russia on Wednesday was described as retaliation and “karma” for Moscow’s invasion.
In Ukraine, Luhansk Governor Sergei Gaidai said the Russians were shelling the entire region, “but they can’t get through our defense.” He said civilians would continue to be evacuated despite the difficult situation.
Gaidai said two schools and 20 houses were destroyed by Russian attacks Friday in the Luhansk towns of Rubezhne and Popasna.
Nikola Hanatov, head of the military administration in Popasna, said two buses sent to evacuate civilians from the city were shelled by Russian troops on Friday and there was no information from drivers. He did not say how many people were on the buses.
In besieged Mariupol, where the United Nations is working to evacuate civilians and fighters hiding in the steel plant, 25 civilians, including six children, left the plant on Saturday, Russia’s TASS news agency reported.
It was unclear where the civilians had gone, and Reuters could not independently verify the report. The Ukrainian military said Russian planes struck Mariupol on Saturday, focusing on the steel plant.
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