The heavy fighting on the ground in Ukraine is currently concentrated in the east of the country and above all in the city of Lysychansk. But recently, Russian rocket attacks also claimed many lives in the south and west of the country. Apparently Mykolayiv will be hit in the morning.
The southern Ukrainian city of Mykolayiv has been rocked by heavy explosions. Alarm sirens sounded in the region just before the detonations. Mayor Olexander Senkevych called on residents to stay in the shelters via the Telegram messenger service in the morning. The cause of the detonations was not immediately clear. In the east, the Russian army is trying to take the city of Lyssychansk in heavy fighting.
At least 21 people were killed in Russian rocket attacks near the port city of Odessa, about 130 kilometers from Mykolaiv, on Friday, according to Ukrainian sources. Among other things, according to the information, a residential building was hit. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy condemned these attacks in his nightly video address as “deliberate and targeted Russian terror”. It’s not “some kind of bug or random missile attack.”
The information could not initially be independently verified. Just days earlier, at least 19 people were killed when a Russian missile struck a shopping mall in the central Ukrainian city of Kremenchuk. The authorities in Kyiv see the incidents as a whole series of deliberate attacks on civilians. Russia has repeatedly denied such allegations. According to Moscow, only military targets would be attacked.
Thousands of civilians have been killed since the war began on February 24. Russia has recently stepped up its attacks, especially in eastern Ukraine. The city of Lysychansk is currently at the center of the fighting. Russian soldiers are attempting to encircle the last of Ukraine’s largest bastions in the Luhansk region, after recently taking the neighboring town of Sieverodonetsk across the river after a week-long battle.
“Private houses in attacked villages are burning down one by one,” Luhansk Governor Serhiy Hajday told Telegram. “With such a high density of fire, we only have time to protect the injured.” It burns in several places at the same time. “We hardly have time to eliminate large fires in Lysychansk.”
In the Kharkiv area, the Russian army is trying to recapture lost positions with the support of artillery, the Ukrainian general staff said. Numerous places would be shelled in order to tie down the Ukrainian army there. A Russian attack was repelled in the Donetsk region, it said. Russian air raids were reported from the Avdiivka area. In the Black Sea, on the other hand, Russia continues to block Ukraine’s sea connections.
