KYIV, May 3 (Reuters) – Russian shelling killed 23 individuals in and close to the southern Ukrainian metropolis of Kherson on Wednesday, hitting a hypermarket, a railway station and residential buildings, the regional governor mentioned.
“The enemy’s targets are the places where we live. Their targets are our lives, and the lives of our children,” governor Oleksandr Prokudin mentioned, saying the most recent demise toll in an internet video on Thursday.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Wednesday decried the assaults on Kherson, condemning “the bloody trail that Russia leaves behind with its shells”.
Prokudin mentioned 46 individuals had additionally been wounded in Wednesday’s assaults.
The useless included three engineers making an attempt to restore injury inflicted on the ability grid in earlier Russian bombardments, native officers mentioned.
Pools of blood and piles of particles lay on the bottom exterior the Kherson hypermarket after the assaults, Reuters correspondents on the scene mentioned.
Russia didn’t instantly touch upon the assaults in Kherson, one of 4 Ukrainian areas it mentioned it annexed final September. Moscow has denied focusing on civilians in its invasion of Ukraine that started in February 2022.
Many home windows had been smashed on the railway station. Three ladies who had been consuming on the time of the assault mentioned they took cowl beneath a desk.
Moscow has stepped up air strikes on Ukraine up to now few days as Kyiv prepares for a counteroffensive wherein it’s anticipated to strive to retake occupied territory in Kherson area.
Ukrainian troops recaptured Kherson metropolis final November after practically eight months of occupation, however Russian troops retreated solely so far as the alternative facet of the Dnipro River, from the place they now shell the town.
Regional governor Oleksandr Prokudin on Wednesday introduced a curfew in Kherson metropolis to final from Friday night till Monday morning for “law enforcement” causes. He gave no different particulars.
Reporting by Pavel Polityuk and Olena Harmash, Editing by Timothy Heritage
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