Massive explosions have shaken the Ukrainian capital and other cities during the morning rush hour in apparent Russian revenge strikes after President Vladimir Putin declared an explosion on the bridge to Crimea to be a terrorist attack.
The attacks were the most intense to hit the Ukrainian capital since the early days of the war and sent residents fleeing for bomb shelters and thick smoke billowing skywards. Police in the city said that at least five people died in the blasts, with 12 people injured.
Explosions were also reported in Lviv, Ternopil and Zhytomyr in Ukraine’s west, and in Dnipro in central Ukraine.
At one of Kyiv’s busiest road junctions, a massive crater had been blown in the intersection. Cars were blown out, buildings were damaged and emergency workers were on the scene.
Two cars and a van near the crater were completely destroyed, blacked and pitted from shrapnel.
Windows had been blown out of buildings at Kyiv’s main Taras Shevchenko University. National Guard troops in full combat gear and carrying assault rifles were lined up outside an education union building.
“Air raid sirens are not subsiding around Ukraine… Unfortunately there are dead and wounded. Please do not leave the shelters,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
On a social media post. he accused Russia of wanting to “wipe us from the face of the Earth”.
“The capital is under attack from Russian terrorists! The missiles hit objects in the city centre (in the Shevchenkivskyi district) and in the Solomyanskyi district. The air raids sirens are going off, and therefore the threat, continues,” mayor Vitali Klitschko posted on social media.
“The central streets of Kyiv have been blocked by law enforcement officers, rescue services are working.”
A spokesperson for the state emergency services said there were dead and wounded, though provided no immediate figures.
Mr Putin said yesterday that the blast a day earlier on the bridge over the Kerch Strait, a major supply route for Moscow’s forces in southern Ukraine, was “an act of terrorism aimed at destroying critically important civilian infrastructure”.
“This was devised, carried out and ordered by the Ukrainian special services,” he said in a video on the Kremlin’s Telegram channel.
Ukraine has not claimed responsibility for the blast, but senior Russian officials demanded a swift response from the Kremlin ahead of a meeting of Mr Putin’s security council later today.
Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev said ahead of the meeting that Russia should kill the “terrorists” responsible for the attack.
“Russia can only respond to this crime by directly killing terrorists, as is the custom elsewhere in the world. This is what Russian citizens expect,” he was quoted as saying by state news agency Tass.
The Kerch bridge is a vital artery for the port of Sevastopol, where the Russian Black Sea fleet is based, and an imposing symbol of Russia’s 2014 annexation of the Crimean Peninsula.
Mr Putin opened the 19km road and rail span linking Crimea to Russia with great fanfare in 2018.
The damage to the bridge came amid battlefield defeats for Russia and initial reports from Ukrainian officials of a mass burial site discovered in the recently liberated eastern town of Lyman.
Mr Putin’s anger over the suspected attack also coincided with growing concerns that Moscow could resort to nuclear weapons, after Mr Putin repeatedly cautioned the West that any attack on Russia could provoke a nuclear response.
Alexander Bastrykin, the head of Russia’s Investigative Committee, said yesterday that a vehicle exploded on the bridge causing a fire.
The vehicle had travelled through Bulgaria, Georgia, Armenia, North Ossetia and Russia’s Krasnodar region before reaching the bridge, he said.
Among those who helped Ukrainian special services prepare the attack were “citizens of Russia and foreign countries,” Mr Bastrykin added in the video on the Kremlin’s Telegram channel.
Images showed part of the bridge’s road blown away, although rail services and partial road traffic resumed.
Fresh attack on Zaporizhzhia
In southeastern Ukraine, Russian shelling overnight destroyed an apartment building in the city of Zaporizhzhia, regional Governor Oleksandr Starukh said early this morning.
At least one person died and five were injured in the attack, a city official said.
The pre-dawn strikes were the third such attack against the region in four days. A strike on an apartment in the city yesterday killed at least 13 people and injured 87 others, including 10 children, according to Ukrainian officials.
Ukraine’s general staff said seven anti-aircraft guided missiles were used in the latest attack.
Russian aircraft launched at least 12 missiles in Sunday’s attack, partially destroying a nine-storey apartment block, levelling five other residential buildings and damaging many more, Mr Starukh said on state-run television.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky condemned the attack as “absolute evil”.
“This was a deliberate hit. Whoever gave the order and whoever carried it out knew what they were targeting,” he said in a video address.
Zaporizhzhia city, about 52km from a Russian-held nuclear power plant, has been under frequent shelling in recent weeks, with 19 people killed on Thursday.
Explosions hit Kyiv after Putin ‘terrorism’ accusations
Source: Viral Trends Report
0 Comments