According to local authorities, at least two people died in a Russian bombardment with cluster munitions in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk. Eight other people were also injured, three of them seriously, said the Ukrainian military governor of the Donetsk region, Pavlo Kyrylenko, on his Telegram channel today. Kiev also reported Russian drone strikes in the west of the country.
According to Kyrylenko, a park in the city and a funeral home were hit. In addition, several cars and regarding ten houses were damaged. “They aim their fire at the city and try to kill as many civilians as possible,” he accused the Russian attackers. The information cannot be independently verified.
A big city before the war
Kramatorsk was a big city before the war. It belongs to the metropolitan area around Kramatorsk and Slowjansk, where around half a million people lived until the start of hostilities a year ago. It is the last major inhabited area in the contested Donetsk region under Kiev’s control. The front is currently around 20 kilometers east of Kramatorsk.
New drone strikes in the west
Hours earlier, Ukraine had reported new drone strikes in the west of the country, particularly in the Lviv region. The Russian army had attacked Ukraine with Iranian-made drones the night before, according to a statement by the Ukrainian army in the online service Telegram. Eleven of 16 drones were “destroyed”. The attacks were launched from the Sea of Azov and from the Russian region of Briansk. The region around Lviv in the extreme west of Ukraine was reportedly particularly targeted by the drones.
According to the Ukrainian authorities, three drones were also shot down in the Dnipro region in the southeast. There were no injuries there either, but “critical infrastructure” was hit in Novomoskovsk, there was a fire, four houses were destroyed and six others were damaged.
However, drones aimed at the capital Kiev were all shot down by the Ukrainian air defense, the city administration said.