At least two civilians have been killed and 23 wounded when a Russian missile struck a veterinary clinic in the south-central Ukrainian city of Dnipro, officials said Friday following an overnight barrage.
“A 69-year-old man has died. He was just passing by when the Russian terrorists’ missile struck the city,” the head of the regional military administration Sergiy Lysak wrote on Telegram.
Less than an hour later, Lysak said the body of a second man was recovered from under the rubble of the veterinary clinic building.
Lysak said the injured included two boys aged three and six, who have been hospitalized along with 19 others. Three of those hospitalized are in a serious condition.
The three-story building was partially destroyed and a fire spread over 1,000 square meters, Lysak wrote on Telegram. He posted a video of firefighters aiming hoses at the smoking rubble.
Local media shared video footage of rescuers helping people with blood on their faces escape from the clinic through corridors full of rubble.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the strike on a medical facility "once again confirms the Russian terrorists’ status of fighters against everything humane and honest."
Lysak said earlier that the Dnipropetrovsk region was "massively attacked" overnight "with rockets and drones.”
In the city of Dnipro, overnight shelling set fire to a house and damaged two others, he said.
Ukraine’s military on Friday morning reported 55 Russian air attacks over the past 24 hours, including 36 drone and four missile strikes.
The barrage included the 13th nighttime attack on the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv in the month of May.
The city’s military administration said all the Russian missiles have been detected and destroyed.
Analysts have attributed Russia’s stepped-up attacks on Ukrainian cities to Moscow’s attempt to stave off the Ukraine forces’ anticipated counteroffensive with advanced Western-supplied weapons.
AFP contributed reporting.
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