Deadly missile strike near Odesa
Ukraine: Action by Russia payback after island withdrawal
POKROVSK, Ukraine — A Russian airstrike on residential areas killed at least 21 people early Friday near the Ukrainian port of Odesa, authorities reported, a day after the withdrawal of Moscow’s forces from an island in the Black Sea had seemed to ease the threat to the city.
Video of the attack before daybreak showed the charred ruins of buildings in the small town of Serhiivka, about 31 miles from Odesa. The Ukrainian president’s office said warplanes fired three missiles that struck an apartment building and a campsite.
Ukrainian authorities interpreted the attack as payback for the withdrawal of Russian troops from Snake Island a day earlier, though Moscow portrayed their departure as a “goodwill gesture” to help unblock exports of grain.
Russian forces took control of the island in the opening days of the war in the apparent hope of using it as a staging ground for an assault on Odesa, Ukraine’s biggest port and the headquarters of its navy.
Odesa has long been coveted by President Vladimir Putin of Russia, whose forces have continued to display willingness to target civilians during the war.
“The occupiers cannot win on the battlefield, so they resort to vile killing of civilians,” said Ivan Bakanov,
head of Ukraine’s security service, the SBU. “After the enemy was dislodged from Snake Island, he decided to respond with the cynical shelling of civilian targets.”
Large numbers of civilians were killed in Russian bombardments earlier in the war, including at a hospital, a theater used as a shelter, and a train station. Until this week, mass casualties involving residents appeared to become less frequent as Moscow concentrated on capturing eastern Ukraine’s Donbas region.
Russian missiles struck the Kyiv region last weekend
after weeks of relative calm around the capital, and an airstrike Monday on a shopping mall in the central city of Kremenchuk killed at least 19 people.
Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelenskyy expressed outrage over Friday’s attack.
“These missiles, Kh-22, were designed to destroy aircraft carriers and other large warships, and the Russian army used them against an ordinary ninestory building with ordinary civilian people,” he said.
Meanwhile, the U.S. announced Friday that it will provide Ukraine with
$820 million in new military aid, including new surfaceto-air missile systems and counter-artillery radars to respond to Russia’s heavy reliance on long-range strikes in the war.
The Pentagon said it would also provide the Ukrainians with up to 150,000 rounds of 155 mm artillery ammunition.
This is the 14th package of military weapons and equipment transferred to Ukraine from Defense Department stocks since last August. All told, the U.S. has provided more than $8.8 billion in weapons and other military
training to Ukraine.
As part of the new package, the U.S. will purchase two systems known as NASAMS, a Norwegiandeveloped anti-aircraft system that is also used to protect the airspace around the White House and Capitol in Washington.
In the attack in Serhiivka, an 11-year-old boy, his mother and the 42-year-old coach of a children’s soccer team were killed, according to Ukrainian news reports. Thirty-eight others, including six children and a pregnant woman, were reported hospitalized. Most of the victims were in the apartment building, Ukrainian emergency officials said.
The Kremlin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, again denied on Friday that Russia was targeting any civilian infrastructure.
Russia’s targets, he said, included ammunition and arms depots, plants that manufacture and repair military equipment, and places where “foreign mercenaries” and “nationalist elements” are based.
Oleh Zhdanov, an independent Ukrainian military analyst, said the Russian pullback from Snake Island bears “colossal psychological significance” for Ukraine.
“Snake Island is key for controlling the Black Sea and could help cover the Russian attack if the Kremlin opted for an amphibious landing operation in Odesa or elsewhere in the region,” he said. “Now those plans are pushed back.”
Ukraine’s military claimed a barrage of its artillery and missiles forced the Russians to flee the island in two small speedboats. The exact number of troops withdrawn was not disclosed.
Zelenskyy said that although the pullout did not guarantee the Black Sea region’s safety, it would “significantly limit” Russian activities there.
In eastern Ukraine, Russian forces kept up their push to encircle the city of Lysychansk, the last stronghold of resistance in Luhansk, one of two provinces that make up the Donbas.