Shelling killed at least 28 people and injured 30, including two children, near a market in the Russian-controlled city of Donetsk in eastern Ukraine on Sunday, according to Russian officials. Moscow blamed Ukraine for the attack, while Kyiv denied responsibility. <\/p>\n
The Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement that a market and shops in the city\u2019s Kirovsky district were targeted with multiple launch rocket systems, with the shelling reportedly coming from the direction of Avdiivka. Kyiv \u201conce again committed a barbaric terrorist act against the civilian population of Russia,\u201d the Russian ministry said. \u201cThere are a large number of victims.\u201d <\/p>\n
Ukraine\u2019s armed forces said they were not responsible for the shelling attacks. \u201cThe Russians are spreading [mis-]information about the strike on a market in Donetsk. We responsibly declare that the forces under the control of the Tavria military formation did not engage in combat operations in this case,\u201d a statement on the Facebook page of the armed forces\u2019 Tavria command said. <\/p>\n
\u201cRussia must be held accountable for the lives of the Ukrainians taken,\u201d it added. <\/p>\n
Russia has responded with outrage to previous Ukrainian attacks but has been responsible for thousands of civilians deaths following its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. <\/p>\n
Russia\u2019s Investigative Committee has launched an investigation and \u201call those involved and responsible for this and other terrorist attacks on our soil will suffer inevitable punishment,\u201d the ministry said. <\/p>\n
Denis Pushilin, the head of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People\u2019s Republic, said that the attack came on the busiest day of the week for the area and that search teams were looking for fragments of weapons. <\/p>\n
At least 27 civilians were killed and at least 25 were injured in the area of a\u00a0market and shops in the Kirovsky district of the city of Donetsk, Pushilin said in a Telegram post. <\/p>\n
Another man was also killed on Sunday in another part of Donetsk city as a result of shelling, Pushilin said. Five additional people were wounded in the city and elsewhere in Russian-occupied parts of the region on Sunday, he said. <\/p>\n
Residential buildings, a school and shops in different Russian-occupied parts of the region were also damaged, he said. <\/p>\n
UN Secretary-General Ant\u00f3nio Guterres condemned the deadly attacks on Russian-controlled parts of Donetsk region, a UN spokesperson said on Sunday. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe Secretary-General strongly condemns all attacks against civilians and civilian infrastructure, including today\u2019s shelling of the city of Donetsk in Ukraine,\u201d the spokesperson said in a statement. <\/p>\n
\u201cAttacks against civilians and civilian infrastructure are prohibited under international humanitarian law, are unacceptable and must stop immediately,\u201d the statement continued. <\/p>\n
Donetsk is one of four Ukrainian regions that Moscow said in 2022 it would recognize as Russian territory \u2013 an annexation process which is illegal under international law. <\/p>\n
The region, which is partially but not fully controlled by Russian forces, is on the frontline of fighting in the east. <\/p>\n
The Donetsk attack comes with the frontlines of the war largely static. <\/p>\n
Ukraine\u2019s counteroffensive failed to deliver major gains and its troops are now under pressure from Russia at several points along the 1,000 kilometer-long frontline. <\/p>\n
Kyiv\u2019s troops have withdrawn from the village of Krokhmalne in the northeast of the country, close to the border between Kharkiv and Luhansk regions \u2013 with an army spokesman saying on Ukrainian TV that its troops\u2019 position have been moved to \u201cwhere it is more advantageous for them to destroy the enemy.\u201d <\/p>\n
In another indication of increasing Russian pressure, Ukraine\u2019s military says it expects to see Russia\u2019s forces step up operations around the embattled town of Avdiivka, as well as nearby Nevelske and Pervomaiske \u2013 which all lie to the immediate northwest of Donetsk city. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe enemy is regrouping, and we are preparing for an increase in their activity,\u201d a Ukrainian army spokesperson said. <\/p>\n
In recent months, Avdiivka has become a focus of Russia\u2019s fight, in much the same way that Bakhmut was in the first half of 2023. The Ukrainian army spokesman said Russia now had about 40,000 Russian personnel in the area. <\/p>\n
A night-time video posted by Leningrad regional boss Alexander Drozdenko showed what appeared to be a significant fire at the Novatek facility in Ust-Luga, which sits on the Gulf of Finland. Later videos showed fire-fighters tackling the blaze. Authorities said there were no injuries. <\/p>\n
According to Novatek\u2019s website, the Ust-Luga complex sees the processing of liquified natural gas products into various types of fuel, including naptha, jet fuel, fuel oil and gasoil. <\/p>\n
The Ukrainian defense source said the products are used to supply, among others, the Russian military, adding: \u201cThe successful attack on this facility will complicate the enemy\u2019s logistics.\u201d . <\/p>\n
Elsewhere, Ukraine also carried out drone strikes in the Tula, Smolensk and Belgorod regions. <\/p>\n
This story has been updated with further developments.<\/em> <\/p>\n\n Shelling killed at least 28 people and injured 30, including two children, near a market in the Russian-controlled city of Donetsk in eastern Ukraine on Sunday, according to Russian officials. Moscow blamed Ukraine for the attack, while Kyiv denied responsibility. The Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement that a market and shops in the <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":14415,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-14414","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14414","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14414"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14414\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14415"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}