Russia bombed a hardware store in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv on Saturday, killing two people and wounding 33. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy condemned the attack as “despicable.”
Kharkiv region governor Oleg Sinegbov said at least two people were killed and 33 were wounded when “two Russian guided bombs struck a hypermarket at a construction site.”
“Two people were killed, two men who worked in a hypermarket,” Sinegubov said in a video posted on Telegram, before adding in a later post that “33 people were injured.”
An AFP video journalist saw thick, black smoke billowing from the burnt-out Epitsentr DIY supermarket building as firefighters sprayed water on the blaze caused by the bombing.
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The Epitsentr chain of hypermarkets sells household and DIY supplies.
“At the moment we know that there may have been more than 200 people inside the hypermarket,” Zelenskiy said in a Telegram message, condemning the daytime attack as targeting “clearly civilians.”
Ukrainian rescue services posted pictures of firefighters spraying water inside a burning building, whose roof was torn off and rubble was scattered everywhere.
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The fire spread over an area of ​​10,000 square metres but firefighters were able to contain it locally, he said.
Ukraine's second-largest city, Kharkiv, is regularly hit by Russian missiles, and at least seven people were killed in an attack there on Thursday.
The latest attack came after Russia launched a ground offensive in the Kharkiv region on May 10. Ukraine said on Friday it had successfully thwarted Moscow's advance and was counterattacking.
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“Russia dealt our Kharkiv construction hypermarket another brutal blow in broad daylight on Saturday,” Zelenskyy said.
“Only a madman like Putin could murder and terrorize people in such a despicable way,” he added, referring to the Russian president, who ordered the deployment of troops into Ukraine in February 2022.
“There were many workers and shoppers inside,” Zelensky said.
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Kharkiv Mayor Igor Terekhov said the store owner said his 15 employees had not been contacted and that around 200 people had been in the building at the time of the attack.
He described the attack as “pure terrorism.”
In the Kharkiv region, Russian forces launched an offensive in the border area on Saturday.
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Russia shelled the village of Kupyansk Buzlovy, a railway hub in the Kharkiv region near the border, wounding five people, the regional prosecutor's office said in a statement.
Police said two vehicles were struck by gunfire: a car with two passengers and an ambulance with a driver, a paramedic and a 64-year-old patient inside.
According to prosecutors, Russia also carried out airstrikes in the Kupyansk region, damaging factories and homes.
Shelling on Saturday in the eastern Donetsk region killed a 40-year-old woman and wounded four others, said Vadim Filashkin, head of the region's administration.
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