Ukraine under heavy bombardment as Zelenskyy calls for more air defences
A Russian missile hit an industrial area in Ukraine’s northern city of Kharkiv on Wednesday, killing at least five people and injuring eight while causing a major fire in a printing house, local authorities said.
The mayor of Kharkiv, Ihor Terekhov, said five others were missing after the strike. In a later posting on Telegram at about 11 pm local time, he said Kharkiv had come under fresh shelling, with explosions in the city.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the strike underscored the lack of proper air defences in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest city, and elsewhere, particularly in northern regions near the Russian border.
The Kharkiv region, which borders Russia to the north and lies close to the frontline, has suffered regular drone and missile attacks during Russia’s two-year-old invasion.
The X-59 missile struck the multi-storey industrial building in the afternoon.
“The building houses production facilities and offices. This is an act of terrorism because it was conducted at a time when the vast majority of the people are at work,” Volodymyr Tymoshko, head of the regional police, was quoted as saying on a police account on Telegram.
Expand article logo Continue reading “In addition to the five dead, there are another five who are missing,” Terekhov, the mayor, said on Telegram.
Olaf Scholz Backs Decision To Buy Weapons From Outside EU
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz hailed on Wednesday decisions to allow the use of European funds to buy weapons from outside Europe for Ukraine.
“This is about solidarity and not economic policy,” he said while speaking to the German parliament in Berlin ahead of the European Union summit.
That should also go for windfall profits from frozen Russian assets, which he said could bring up to 5 billion euros this year and in the coming years, Scholz said.
Those resources should be used for ammunition and weapons that are important for Ukraine now, “and not for all sorts of general things that one might also want,” he said.
Scholz emphasised his recent discussions with the French and Polish leaders.
“We will support Ukraine for as long as it is necessary; we will at the same time ensure that NATO does not become a party to this conflict, and we will not accept a dictated peace at Ukraine’s expense,” he said.
The German leader also pointed to the importance of stepping up weapons production, and noted a recent agreement to build production capacity in Ukraine with partners there.
Germany, France and Poland vowed Friday to procure more weapons for Kyiv and step up production of military equipment along with partners in Ukraine, promising that Ukraine can rely on the trio of European powers as it tries to overcome a shortage of military resources.
“We stand together – Germany and France, the Weimar Triangle, the whole European Union, and that is the message we are sending to Russia with all these decisions,” Scholz said.
“If the Russian president thinks he just has to sit out this war and we will weaken in our support, then he has miscalculated,” he added.
