KYIV, Ukraine (AP) – Drone footage obtained by The Associated Press shows the Ukrainian village of Ocheretine has been destroyed in fighting.village is being targeted Russian troops in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine.
Russian forces have advanced into the region, attacking Kiev’s exhausted and depleted army with artillery, drones and bombs. Ukraine’s military acknowledged that Russian forces had gained a “foothold” in Oceletine, which had a pre-war population of about 3,000 people, but said fighting continued.
Residents scrambled to evacuate the village, some of them 98 year old womanwho walked She traveled about 10 kilometers (six miles) alone, wearing slippers and using a cane, to reach the front line in Ukraine last week.
Not a single person is seen in the video, and none of the buildings in Oceletin appear to have survived the fighting. Most homes, apartment complexes and other buildings are damaged beyond repair, with many smashed into piles of wood and bricks. Factories in the suburbs also suffered major damage.
Footage also showed smoke billowing from several homes and fires in at least two buildings.
Elsewhere, Russia has stepped up attacks on Ukraine’s second-largest city, Kharkiv, in recent weeks. Hitting regional energy infrastructure And it terrorizes its 1.3 million residents.
Russian forces attacked Kharkiv in northeastern Ukraine with a drone explosion, injuring four people and damaging a two-story civilian building that was set on fire overnight, regional governor Ole Sinievov announced Saturday.
Four people, including a 13-year-old boy, were injured by falling debris, he said on the messaging app Telegram.
Russia’s state agency RIA reported on Saturday that Moscow forces attacked a drone warehouse in Kharkiv used by Ukrainian forces overnight, citing Sergei Lebedev, a local pro-Moscow guerrilla coordinator. His comments could not be independently verified.
Russian forces continued their attacks on Kharkov and surrounding areas on Saturday, according to updates posted by Sinyevov and other Ukrainian officials on the Telegram messenger app. One strike hit a private company in the city’s industrial area, injuring at least five people, Sinievov said. The governor’s report said a 49-year-old civilian was killed in a further attack outside his home in Slobozhanske, a village northeast of the city.
Three people were injured in rocket attacks on “public infrastructure” in the Black Sea port of Odesa, which has been repeatedly targeted in recent days, local governor Ole Kiper said.
The Ukrainian military said Russia launched a total of 13 Shahed drones overnight into the Kharkov and Dnipropetrovsk regions of eastern Ukraine, all of which were shot down by Ukrainian air defense forces.
Ukraine’s Energy Ministry said Saturday that overnight airstrikes damaged power substations in the Dnipropetrovsk region, causing temporary power outages to homes and businesses.
The region’s governor, Serhiy Raisak, said debris from the fallen drone damaged critical infrastructure and three homes, one of which caught fire. Two residents were hospitalized.
Russia’s Defense Ministry claimed early Saturday that Russian forces shot down four long-range, U.S.-supplied ATACMS missiles overnight over Crimea, which it illegally annexed from Ukraine in 2014, but the ministry did not provide further details. Ta.
Ukraine recently began using missiles secretly provided by the United States to attack Russian-controlled areas, including a military airfield in Crimea and another area east of the occupied city of Berdyansk. US officials announced this last week.
The new missile, long sought by Ukrainian leaders, would give Ukraine a striking range of up to 300 kilometers (190 miles), almost double the intermediate-range weapon it received from the United States last October. .
Ukrainian drones also damaged communications infrastructure on the outskirts of the Russian city of Belgorod, about 50 kilometers (31 miles) from the Ukrainian border, according to the local governor. Vyacheslav Gladkov did not say what the site was used for.
Hours later, Gladkov reported that five people were hospitalized with shrapnel wounds and other injuries in the city of Belgorod after a strong explosion damaged about 30 homes and started two fires on Saturday. . He did not immediately say what caused the explosion.
