Russian airstrikes target Odesa, Mykolaiv
K Y IV: Russia targeted Ukraine’s southern Black Sea regions of Odesa and Mykolaiv with airstrikes on Tuesday, hiting private buildings and port infrastructure with missiles fired from long-range bomber aircrat, the Ukrainian military said.
In the Odesa region, buildings in coastal villages were hit and caught fire, Ukraine’s Operational Command South said on Facebook.
In the Mykolaiv region, port infrastructure was targeted despite agreements intended to allow grain grain shipments to resume from Ukraine’s Black Sea ports.
Hours ater the strikes, a Moscow-installed official in southern Ukraine said the Odesa and Mykolaiv regions would soon be “liberated” by Russian forces, just like the already occupied Kherson region further east.
“The Kherson region and the city of Kherson have been liberated forever,” Russian state news agency RIA Novosti quoted the region’s Russiaappointed official, Kirill Stremousov, as saying.
On the diplomatic front, Russia’s top diplomat repeated his insistence that Moscow was ready to hold talks with Ukraine on ending the war, though he once again claimed that Kyiv’s Western allies oppose a deal.
“We never refused to have talks, because everybody knows that any hostilities end at the negotiating table,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Tuesday during a trip to Uganda.
He said negotiations have gone no further since a meeting between the two sides in Istanbul at the end of March.
While Ukrainian officials have spoken of a possible counteroffensive in the south, the British Defense Ministry said on Tuesday there was no indication a Ukrainian warship and a stockpile of anti-ship missiles were at Odesa’s port, as Moscow claimed when it struck the site over the weekend.
The British ministry said Russia sees Ukraine’s use of anti-ship missiles as “a key threat” limiting its Black Sea Fleet.
“This has significantly undermined the overall invasion plan, as Russia cannot realistically atempt an amphibious assault to seize Odesa,” the ministry said. “Russia will continue to prioritise efforts to degrade and destroy Ukraine’s anti-ship capability.”
It added that “Russia’s targeting processes are highly likely routinely undermined by dated intelligence, poor planning, and a top-down approach to operations.”