By Guy Faulconbridge
MOSCOW (Reuters) – At least seven people were killed and 17 injured when an entire section of a Russian apartment block collapsed after being hit by a Soviet-era missile launched by Ukraine and shot down by Russia, Russian officials said.
In one of the deadliest attacks to date in the Belgorod region, Ukraine launched what Russian authorities said was a massive missile attack using Tochka ballistic missiles and Adler and RM-70 Vampire multiple launch rocket systems (MLRS).
Images from the scene showed at least 10 floors of the building collapsing. Later, as emergency services searched the rubble for survivors, the roof collapsed and people ran for their lives, with dust and debris falling behind them.
The Russian Defense Ministry said the attack, which it called a “terrorist attack on residential areas”, occurred at 0840 GMT and involved at least 12 missiles.
“Fragments from one of the downed Tochka-U missiles damaged an apartment building in the city of Belgorod,” the ministry said.
Russian news agencies said at least seven people were killed and 17 injured, including two children. Others were still trapped under the rubble.
Both Ukraine and Russia say they do not target civilians, although many civilians have been killed in the war by both sides.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said the attack was a targeted attack on civilians that showed the criminality of both Ukraine and its supporters – primarily the United States and its European allies.
There was no immediate comment from Ukraine on the attack.
KHARKIV FRONT
After heavy shelling in Ukraine’s northeastern Kharkiv region, Russian forces have stormed across the border in recent days and say they have driven Ukrainian forces out of at least nine villages in the region.
The move threatens to open a new front and has forced Ukraine to send additional troops to the area as Russian forces advance at key points along the front in the south and east.
Russian troops said on Sunday they had seized four other villages – Hatyshche, Krasne, Morokhovets, Oliinykove – in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region.
Russian military bloggers said Russia was taking advantage of its numerical superiority on the battlefield to advance in force into relatively undefended areas with small units of highly mobile troops, which then surrounded Ukrainian positions.
Ukraine’s military chief said his country’s forces face a difficult situation in the fighting in the Kharkiv region, but they are doing everything they can to hold the line.
“Defense Forces units are fighting fierce defensive battles, attempts by the Russian invaders to break through our defenses have been stopped,” said Oleksandr Syrskyi.
In response to the Ukrainian attacks on Belgorod, President Vladimir Putin suggested in March that Moscow could attempt to establish a buffer zone within Ukrainian territory due to the Belgorod attacks.
Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.
The conflict in eastern Ukraine began in 2014, after a pro-Russian president was ousted in Ukraine’s Maidan Revolution and Russia annexed Crimea, with Russian-backed separatist forces fighting Ukraine’s armed forces.
Around 14,000 people were killed there between 2014 and the end of 2021, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), including 3,106 civilians.
(Reporting by Reuters; Editing by Sharon Singleton)
