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At least 15 people, including three children, were killed when Russian forces attacked the Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia with five glide bombs, President Volodymyr Zelensky and emergency services said.
The bombs hit residential buildings in the south-eastern city on Saturday morning. At least 16 people were injured, while others remained missing and were believed to be trapped beneath the rubble, the BBC reported.
Images and videos from the scene showed an apartment block largely destroyed. “The ground floor was hit, and the floors above just collapsed,” acting Mayor Regina Kharchenko told Ukrainian television from the site.
More than 80 workers were taking part in search and rescue operations, which were expected to continue throughout the day, Kharchenko said. Rescuers were stopping regularly to listen for signs of survivors under the debris.
Kharchenko said Russia had struck “our very heart” and that children were among those killed, describing their deaths as “awful grief for their families. For the city.”
Zelensky said 13 other regions had also been attacked overnight. “Our responses to [these] Russian strikes will come,” he said.
He also said Russia interprets any easing of pressure as a signal that it can continue the war. “Russia must understand that the war needs to be stopped, and for that, it must feel its losses,” he wrote on X.
The attack came hours after US President Donald Trump announced a deal to import Russian diesel into the United States. Zelensky has criticised the deal, calling it a gift to Russian President Vladimir Putin and “an investment in a war that must be ended, not prolonged”.
Recent attacks have caused civilian casualties
Russia and Ukraine have intensified attacks on infrastructure in recent months as the war continues. Zaporizhzhia, a regional centre with more than 700,000 residents, is less than 10 miles (16 km) from the front line and is frequently targeted by Russian drones and missiles.
The latest strike follows a rise in Russian attacks causing civilian casualties. On Thursday, at least 33 people were killed in a Russian glide bomb attack on two civilian buses in Kramatorsk, in the eastern Donetsk region. A day earlier, 22 people, including five children, died when a Russian missile hit an apartment building in Pryluky, east of Kyiv.
The United Nations said civilian casualties in Ukraine rose by 55% in the first eight months of this year. Russia has also targeted Ukrainian energy infrastructure, intensifying its attacks each winter since Putin launched a full-scale invasion in 2022. Ukraine, in turn, has attacked infrastructure in Russia, most recently data centres owned by “Yandex”.
