One dead in Russian strike on Odesa, officials say
Russia has launched a “massive” drone attack on the capital, Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko has said, while a maternity ward in Odesa has also been targeted.
The Odesa drone attack hit medical facilities and residential buildings, killing a 59-year-old man and injuring four, Governer Oleg Kiper said on Telegram.
In the capital, emergency services were called to four districts a couple ofhours after midnight on Tuesday, Klitschko said on the Telegram messaging app.
The latest attacks come after Russia’s biggest drone strike on Ukraine on Monday, which Moscow said was a retaliatory measure for Ukraine’s recent attacks inside Russia.The covert “Operation Spider Web” targeted Russian bomber planes.
After Operation Spider Web struck air bases deep inside Russia on 1 June, US President Donald Trump called Vladimir Putin and said the Russian president had promised to respond “very strongly” to the attacks.
Air raid alerts were in place across large parts of Ukraine during the attack early on Tuesday, the country’s official air aid map showed, including the Donetsk, Luhansk and Kharkiv regions in the east.
“Stay in shelters! The massive attack on the capital continues,” Kyiv MayorKlitschko warned on Telegram.
The head of Kyiv’s military administration Timur Tkachenko said on Telegram that the attacks on various districts happened “simultaneously”.
Debris from “downed targets” fell on several different buildings across the city and fires broke out at a residential building and in warehouses, he added.
In Odesa, Governer Kiper said patients and staff managed to evacuate the medical station and maternity ward that were targeted, while ambulances were damaged.
Those that were injured were receiving medical assistance, he added.
The 59-year-old who was killed has not been publicly identified.
This attack follows the start of a prisoner swap on Monday that will see sick and heavily wounded prisoners of war, those under the age of 25 and the bodies of 12,000 soldiers returned.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the exchange would unfold “in several stages”, describing it as a “complicated” process with “many sensitive details”.
Russian President Vladimir Putin launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
