Russian forces make renewed push to take eastern Ukraine towns with drones, missiles and mortars
KYIV, Ukraine — At least three civilians were killed and others wounded in Ukraine on Friday and Saturday, as Russian forces continued to shell areas across the country and pushed forward near an embattled eastern city, local Ukrainian officials reported Saturday.
A man died as Russian forces shelled the Ukrainian-held town of Nikopol from their stronghold at Ukraine’s largest nuclear plant, according to Ukrainian local Gov. Serhii Lysak. Lysak said that emergency services in Nikopol were working to assess the damage.
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Russian troops took over the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant early in the war, sparking intermittent fears of a radiation incident as shelling persisted near the site, often targeting Ukrainian-controlled settlements across the Dnieper River.
In Kryvyi Rih, the central Ukraine hometown of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, , a 60-year-old man died on Friday evening when a Russian missile slammed into an industrial facility, according to Telegram posts by Mayor Oleksandr Vilkul. The man’s wife was hospitalized with serious shrapnel wounds, Vilkul said.
The mayor reported that Russian missiles and drones hit the same place again overnight, causing unspecified damage and sparking a fire that was put out by morning. Vilkul did not elaborate on the site’s nature or whether it was linked to Ukraine’s war effort. He said nobody was hurt in the second strike.
Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov later told reporters that Russian forces destroyed the Ukrainian military’s fuel and ammunition depots near Kryvyi Rih’s local airport.
There was no immediate response from Ukrainian officials to Konashenkov’s claim.
In southern Ukraine’s front-line Kherson region, one civilian was killed and another wounded during “mass shelling” attacks by Russian troops, Gov. Oleksandr Prokudin said Saturday. The Russians used mortars, artillery, tanks, drones, and multiple-rocket launchers to target the region, striking some residential areas, Prokudin wrote in a Telegram post.
Russian shelling over the past day also wounded one civilian in the front-line city of Avdiivka, in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, acting local Gov. Ihor Moroz reported on Saturday. Avdiivka has been fiercely contested by Russian and Ukrainian forces in recent weeks as Kyiv’s forces try to hold off a renewed Russian assault.
Moroz said that exploding drones, missiles, mortars and artillery shells fired by Russian troops also struck other parts of the region.
