Reuters
[file photo]
Flags across Kyiv were lowered to half-mast on Wednesday, as Ukrainians mourned more than two dozen people killed a day earlier in Russia’s deadliest strike on the capital this year.
Russia sent 440 drones and fired 32 missiles during the overnight attack, said President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, partly flattening a residential building, in the latest blow to a war-weary population as diplomatic efforts to end the grinding conflict bear little fruit.
Mayor Vitali Klitschko said on Wednesday the death toll had reached 28, but that a search operation was continuing. Two people were also killed in a separate strike on the southern port city of Odesa.
Residents visited the site of the partly destroyed apartment building, where rescue workers dug through chunks of debris amid the din of heavy machinery. A Reuters correspondent saw two bodies being removed from the rubble.
“That kind of nation has no right to exist and bring such suffering to people,” said Alla Martyniuk, 46, referring to Russians.
Ukrainian officials said about 27 locations in Kyiv, including educational institutions and critical infrastructure, had been hit during the multi-wave attack. Scores more people were wounded.
Stream the best of Fiji on VITI+. Anytime. Anywhere.
