Six die in Ukraine as Moscow steps up strikes

KYIV: A missile strike on a residential building in Ukraine killed six and wounded dozens on Monday, as Russia said it stepped up strikes against Ukrainian military facilities in response to attacks on its territory, including Moscow.

Two missiles landed close to the centre of the central Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rig just after 9:00am (0600 GMT), Ukrainian Interior Minister Igor Klymenko wrote on Telegram.

Among the dead were a 10-year-old girl and her 45-year-old mother, while 75 people were injured, according to local authorities.

One of the strikes hit a large nine-storey residential apartment block, punching a huge hole in the facade that destroyed flats on several floors and sparked a fire.

Firefighters used a cherry-picker crane to direct jets of water at the fire, while the emergency ministry said part of the building had collapsed while the rubble was being cleared.

As the toll of the strike rose, Russia said it had intensified attacks on military infrastructure in Ukraine after increasingly frequent drone assaults blamed on Kyiv.

Russia on Sunday said it had downed Ukrainian drones targeting Moscow and annexed Crimea in the latest wave of drone attacks.

‘Act of desperation’

“Against the background of the failure of the so-called ‘counteroffensive’, Kyiv… has focused on carrying out terrorist attacks on civilian infrastructure,” Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said on Monday.

In response, “the intensity of our strikes against Ukrainian military facilities… has been considerably increased,” Shoigu said.

Sunday’s drone attack damaged two office towers in a Moscow business district, shattering several windows and leaving documents strewn on the ground.

The capital and its environs, lying about 500 kilometres from the Ukrainian border, had rarely been targeted during the conflict until several drone attacks this year.