Moscow stepped up its attacks on the city in Ukraine’s southeast by launching sustained bombardment involving glide bombs, local authorities said.
Russia launched new strikes on Zaporizhzhia, killing one and wounding six, authorities said Tuesday morning.
Local officials said it was the second consecutive night that glide bombs attacked the southeastern city, with up to 40 multi-storey buildings sustaining critical damage.
Governor of Zaporizhzhia Oblast Ivan Fedorov said the attack featured glide bombs — retro-fitted Soviet-era weapons. This is the first time these weapons have been used to target the city since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine started in 2022, he said.
Deputy head of the regional state administration Ruslan Movcha said Russia attacked the city’s centre three times on Monday, twice with shelling and once with glide bombs.
Ukraine’s State Emergency Services posted on social media platform X that the attack lasted two hours and targeted the regional centre.
Local resident Kostiantyn Hrudko said the roof, windows, and doors of his housing were damaged as a result. “I heard a whistle and we fell to the ground,” said Hrudko, a displaced person originally from the city of Kherson.
Another local resident, Lado Chikobava, said he hit the deck after he heard a loud “bang” and saw sparks. “I got up, looked, and the neighbour’s house was smashed up,” he said.
The Zaporizhzhia region is one of four — along with Donetsk, Kherson and Luhansk — in southern and eastern Ukraine that Russia partially and illegally annexed in September 2022.
Meanwhile, the governor of Russia’s Belgorod region said on Tuesday that Ukrainian shelling on a village close to the border with Ukraine killed three people, including a child.
“Yesterday, as a result of shelling by the Ukrainian Armed Forces, three civilians were killed. One of them is a 15-year-old girl. We all mourn with the families and friends of the deceased. Four people were seriously injured, two children among them,” Vyacheslav Gladkov stated on Telegram.
Euronews could not independently verify these claims.
Additional sources • EBU, AP
