Missile wreckage outside the station
Dozens of people were killed and regarding 100 injured in a Russian missile attack on a train station in eastern Ukraine, officials said.
Ukrainian officials said thousands of people were waiting for evacuation trains at Kramatorsk station on Friday morning, in a desperate attempt to escape heavy Russian bombing across the wider Donetsk region.
Since then, Ukraine and Russia have blamed each other for the deadly attack.
Kramatorsk is one of the far eastern stations still operating in Ukraine.
Kramatorsk Mayor Oleksandr Honcharenko told the BBC that the railway station was bombed at around 10:30 local time (07:30 GMT) on Friday. The head of Ukraine’s railways said two missiles had hit the area.
Subsequently, the Ukrainian Prosecutor’s Office said nearly 4,000 people – mostly women and children – were at the station at the time.
The head of the Donetsk region, Pavlo Kirilenko, wrote on his Telegram page that the death toll had reached 50. He said that five children were among the dead.
Local officials said regarding 100 people were injured, some in critical condition.
There are fears that the death toll will rise further.
Kramatorsk is one of the main points for the evacuation of residents out of eastern Ukraine. And local authorities publish details of trains leaving the city.
Ukrainian officials say Russia is hitting civilian targets across the country, including hospitals, nurseries and schools.
But Russia denies targeting civilians, saying it is carrying out a “special military operation” to confront Ukrainian “nationalists” and “neo-Nazis”.
Ukraine’s deputy prime minister, Olha Stefanichina, told the BBC that following “strong resistance” from the Ukrainian army, Russia had launched a “massive operation” on civilians.
Amnesty International says it has verified different attacks using cluster munitions that hit a kindergarten and nursery, and a ballistic missile that hit a hospital.
