Russian attacks yesterday killed one person in Ukraine’s Kherson region as the toll from a drone strike in the city of Odesa climbed to 10, authorities said.
The latest deaths came a day after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy pleaded with Western allies to supply more air-defense systems.
The Ukrainian Ministry of Internal Affairs reported one death and three people wounded in the southern Kherson region yesterday following Russian strikes.
Photo: Reuters
In the southern port city of Odesa on the Black Sea, two more bodies — a woman and her eight-month-old baby — were found following a Russian drone strike overnight between Friday and Saturday.
A seven-month-old baby and a two-year-old child were among the previously reported eight victims.
“Russia continues to hit civilians,” Zelenskiy wrote on social media.
“We need more air defenses from our partners. We need to strengthen the Ukrainian air shield to add more protection for our people from Russian terror. More air-defense systems and more missiles for air-defense systems save lives.”
Ukraine is on the back foot in the two-year war as a crucial US$60 billion aid package is held up in the US Congress.
In Odesa, “a nine-story building was destroyed as a result of an attack by Russian terrorists,” Ukrainian Minister of Internal Affairs Igor Klymenko wrote on Telegram on Saturday.
About 8 people were still unaccounted for.
Footage from the scene showed several floors of a residential building collapsed and its facade ripped off.
Kyiv appeared to have launched its own overnight drone attack, with the Russian Ministry of Defense early yesterday saying it had shot down 38 drones over the occupied territory of Crimea.
An apparent Ukrainian drone also damaged a residential building a day earlier in St Petersburg.
Videos on Russian social media showed what appeared to be a drone spiraling downward into the building, triggering an explosion that blew out windows and caused small fires.
Ukrainian media reported that the drone was shot down by Russia’s air defenses while targeting an oil depot about 1km from the crash site.
Russia also expressed outrage at a leak of confidential German army talks in which officers allegedly discussed missile strikes on the Crimean Peninsula.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Saturday promised a full investigation after the head of Russia’s state-run RT news outlet posted the alleged leaked recording on social media.
A spokeswoman for the German Ministry of Defense on Saturday said that a secret air force conversation had been tapped, but that they could not say for certain whether any changes had been made to the conversation in the leaked audio file.
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