Other strikes hit Kharkiv and Sumy regions. Some buildings were damaged in “a series of explosions” in Kharkiv, said the mayor of Ukraine’s second largest city, Igor Terekhov. One person was killed and two injured in the Sumy region, which has been the target of “more than 50 attacks” in the past 24 hours, according to Governor Dmytro Zhyvytsky.
Renowned grain farmer and his wife killed
A well-known Ukrainian grain entrepreneur, Oleksiï Vadatoursky, and his wife were killed in the Russian bombing of the city of Mykolayiv. The 74-year-old was the owner of the leading Ukrainian grain logistics company Niboulon.
“This is not a coincidence, but a premeditated murder,” said Mykhaïlo Podoliak, adviser to the Ukrainian presidency. “The fact that the rocket hit the bedroom of her house leaves no doubt: Vadatursky was the target. Oleksiï Vadatoursky, millionaire and “Hero of Ukraine”, was very prominent. His company exported grain to 70 countries.
The damage after the shelling in Kharkiv.
SERGEY BOBOK/AFP
52,000 children in the Donetsk region
On Saturday evening, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on the population to evacuate the Donetsk region in the east of the country, whose cities have been the target of deadly bombings. “A government decision has been made on the mandatory evacuation of the Donetsk region,” Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a video address on Saturday evening. “Please evacuate,” the Ukrainian president demanded. “The more residents now leave the Donetsk region, the fewer people the Russian army will kill.” “At this stage of the war, terror is Russia’s main weapon,” he said.
According to estimates by the Ukrainian authorities, at least 200,000 civilians still live in the areas of the Donetsk region that are not under Russian occupation. “In total, there are currently about 52,000 children in the Donetsk region. The police explain to the parents that the evacuation includes providing shelter and providing all necessary assistance,” the national police said.
Five injured in Crimea
On Sunday morning, the governor of the city of Sevastopol on Moscow’s annexed Crimea announced that the headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet had been attacked with a drone, injuring five. “This morning Ukrainian nationalists decided to spoil for us the Russian Fleet Day,” celebrated in Russia on Sunday, Mikhail Razvozjayev wrote on Telegram.
He said a drone landed in the courtyard of fleet headquarters and exploded, injuring five staff members. All Russian Fleet Day celebrations “have been canceled for security reasons,” Razvojayev said.
A Russian bombardment destroyed a school in Kharkiv on Saturday.
SERGEY BOBOK/AFP
On Friday, a bomb attack on a barracks housing captured Ukrainian soldiers in Olenivka, Russian-held territory in the Donetsk region, left about fifty dead. A “premeditated Russian war crime,” according to Zelenskyy.
What happened in Olenivka?
Ukraine’s Human Rights Commissioner Dmytro Lubinetsk announced on Saturday that he had asked the Red Cross and the United Nations Human Rights Monitoring Mission, which oversaw the surrender negotiated with the Russians of defenders of the Azovstal factory in Mariupol in May, to go to Olenivka.
After long weeks of siege and resistance at the steel site, some 2,500 Ukrainian fighters had surrendered and Moscow had announced they would be imprisoned at Olenivka.
“When the Azovstal defenders left the factory, the UN and the ICRC acted as guarantors of the life and health of our soldiers,” said Zelenskyy on Friday evening, calling on the UN and the Red Cross to “react”.
The Russian investigative committee announced the shelling of Olenivka on Friday, saying Ukrainian forces themselves “fired on the prison where members of the Azov battalion are being held, using American projectiles from the Himars system.” The Ukrainian General Staff denied these allegations, saying it was up to the Russian or separatist forces to “camouflage the torture of prisoners and the executions” that had been “carried out”.
According to Ukrainian intelligence, the attack was “carried out by mercenaries from the Wagner Division,” a Russian mercenary company whose men are primarily accused of crimes in Syria and Africa.