This photo taken on September 4, 2024 shows damaged residential buildings after a missile attack in Lviv. Seven people, including three children, have been killed in Russia’s attack on the western Ukrainian city of Lviv, the interior minister said on September 4, 2024. | Photo credit: AFP
Seven people were killed on Wednesday (September 4, 2024) in a Russian attack in Lviv, western Ukraine, hundreds of kilometres from the frontlines, officials said. Moscow has claimed gains in the east of the war-torn country.
Russia has stepped up air strikes on Ukraine since Kiev launched an unprecedented cross-border offensive into Russia’s Kursk region last month.
The attack on Lviv, which is sheltering thousands of people displaced by two years of war, came a day after Russia attacked the city of Poltava, which killed 53 people in one of the deadliest assaults of the invasion.
“A total of seven people died in Lviv, including three children. Search and rescue operations are ongoing,” Interior Minister Igor Klimenko wrote on Telegram.
According to Ukraine’s Prosecutor General’s Office, the missile attack also injured 40 people, and damaged schools and medical facilities, as well as buildings in Lviv’s historic centre.
This western city near the Polish border is home to a UNESCO World Heritage Site covering its old town, and has been largely spared the brutal attacks that rocked eastern cities.
Regional chief Maksim Kozitsky said at least seven “architectural objects of local importance” were damaged in the barrage on Wednesday (September 4, 2024), all located in the historic area of Lviv and the UNESCO buffer zone.
Following the overnight attacks, Ukraine has again sought long-range weapons to retaliate by striking western air defence systems as well as targets deep inside Russia.
Sirens sounded in Lviv before sunrise on Wednesday (September 4, 2024), advising people to take shelter as air defenses worked to ward off a barrage of missiles, said Mayor Andriy Sadovy.
‘Inhuman screams’
“I heard horrible inhuman screams, ‘Save us,’” said Yelizaveta, a 27-year-old Lviv resident who ran to seek shelter in her basement.
Others, like internally displaced person Anastasia Grinko from Dnipro, did not have time to reach a shelter.
“The rocket fell on our house. Everything blew up. I was miraculously in the corridor at the time of the explosion, so I was not hurt much,” she said.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy condemned “Russian terrorist attacks on Ukrainian cities”.
The air force said the attack on Lviv was part of a wider offensive on Ukraine, which saw 13 missiles and 29 drones fired at the war-torn country.
The Air Force said it shot down seven missiles and 22 drones.
Ukrainian emergency services said debris from a missile fell in the centre of the town of Kryvyi Rih, damaging the Arena Hotel and injuring five people.
“The hotel is destroyed from the first to the third floors. Thank God everyone is alive,” city chief Oleksandr Vilkul said.
Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmygal called for greater air defences and long-range weapons to deter Russia in the wake of the attack.
Weapons delivered by Ukraine’s Western partners since the invasion have often been subject to sanctions that prohibit their use against targets inside Russia.
The overnight assault came a day after Russia launched one of the deadliest attacks of its two-and-a-half-year offensive on the central city of Poltava.
The attack on a military educational institution killed 53 people and injured 271 – although officials did not say how many of the victims were military personnel or civilians.
Russia advances
The attack on Lviv comes as Russia claims to have seized the village of Karlivka in eastern Ukraine, one of several advances it has made in recent weeks towards capturing Kiev-held Pokrovsk.
Karlivka is about 30km from Pokrovsk, a city on a key supply route for the Ukrainian military and a long-time target for Moscow.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Monday (September 2, 2024) that his troops were advancing rapidly in Donbass which includes the Ukrainian regions Donetsk and Luhansk.
“Our aggression in Donbass has not been this strong for a long time,” he said.
Ukraine witnessed a major government reshuffle this week as President Zelenskyy seeks to improve government efficiency after two-and-a-half years of Russian invasion.
Ukraine’s wartime Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba submitted his resignation on Wednesday (September 4, 2024), a day after six other officials, including cabinet ministers, said they were stepping down.
Published – September 04, 2024 10:40 PM IST